All The King's Men
by ChequeRoot
Summary: Montgomery Burns grows older. He knows some day he will have to surrender control of his beloved nuclear plant, after all, Waylon Smithers will not stay young forever either. Perhaps Waylon's son, Ryan, recently graduated from college, might hold the solution to Burns' dilemma.
1. Chapter 1

**_Author's Note:_**

 _This story features the same familiar characters from The Saga of Ryan Smithers. For those not familiar, Ryan is the son of Waylon Smithers, and his late wife Lydia. He owes his creation to the wonderfully talented creator and artist Gav-Imp of DeviantArt, who has allowed me to bring him into my world, and add a bit of my own unique spin on his tale. For that, I am eternally grateful._

 _If you haven't read The Saga of Ryan Smithers, which comprises three stories, at the very least you might consider reading (or *gasp*) skimming through "The Inception of Ryan Smithers" to learn a bit more about the young man, and his origins._

 _If, however, you are already familiar with him, then by all means jump in to this piece._

 _As always, I offer my most heartfelt thanks for your presence. For, after all, without my dear Readers, would there even be a story to tell?_

 _Most Faithfully Yours,_

 _~ Muse_

* * *

 **"You have to leave the city of your comfort and go into the wilderness of your intuition. What you'll discover will be wonderful. What you'll discover is yourself."**

Alan Alda

 **"I had learnt the satisfaction which comes from hardship and the pleasure which derives from abstinence; the contentment of a full belly; the richness of meat; the taste of clean water; the ecstasy of surrender when the craving of sleep becomes a torment; the warmth of a fire in the chill of dawn."**

Wilfred Thesiger

* * *

Ryan Smithers beamed proudly and clutched the rolled tube tightly in his left hand. He looked out over the sea of faces to where his fathers sat, clapping vigorously. He tried not to smile, but couldn't help himself as he shook the Dean's hand for a last time, and made his way across the stage.

His graduation black gown swirled about his ankles, catching slightly on the cloth of the wool pants he wore beneath. It was incredibly hot under his cap and gown, despite the cool May weather. His leather shoes, polished to a mirror gloss caught the sunlight, and reflected it back into his eyes.

Despite the deafening applause from friends and the audience around him, the world felt strangely silent. Ryan moved as if in a dream, thoughts whirling through his head as he stepped down from the stage. A kid from Philadelphia who hadn't even thought about college, much less considered that he'd be eventually graduating with two degrees in Mathematics. It had been a hard four years, pulling a double major, and at times he'd struggled just to keep his head afloat.

At the end though, it didn't matter. None of that mattered. He had his degrees, following in his father's footsteps of graduating from Yale University.

His step-father, technically, he knew. But as he took his seat with the rest of the graduates, he felt that little distinction hardly mattered. He only wished his mother were there to see him in person. Ryan liked to believe she was there in spirit at least, cheering along with the rest of the crowd.

 _I did it, mom_ , he thought as he removed his cap for a moment and fanned his sweat-covered brow with a handy commencement brochure. _I made it_.

The remainder of the ceremony seemed far too long, wearing on the nerves of both Ryan and his fathers alike. It wasn't that he minded watching his classmates walk the stage, but then there came the mandatory speeches which had little bearing on his personal life experiences. Somebody famous he'd never really heard of, an east coast politician talked about how hard it was to be young men and women in today's era, and got an honorary doctorate at the end of the speech.

Ryan rolled his eyes, and reread the list of donors on the back of the commencement booklet. His fathers were there, of course, the level of their financial contribution mercifully undisclosed. It only listed them as part of the Nathan Hale Leaders Circle.

For that, Ryan was privately grateful.

It must've been his father Waylon's influence that kept the details and dollar amount off the list. If Monty were to have had his way, it probably would've been listed in bold font, and quite possibly gold ink. Ryan gave a brief thanks to whatever deity had helped maintain as much anonymity as possible.

Life at Yale had been easy enough the first two years. As a freshman, and through most of his sophomore year the name "Ryan H. Smithers" was unimpressive, and largely unnoticed by faculty and fellow students alike. He was treated no differently than anyone else.

Somewhere in his junior year, word had leaked out that he was one of those legacy students, with a family history of attending Yale. He wasn't sure who outed him, or why, but suddenly it became known that he was a _Burns_ , not just a Smithers, then everything changed.

Professors suddenly took a greater interest in his academic performance. A few kids he thought where his friends started treating him like he thought he was better than them; on the flip side some of the snooty legacy heirs tried making him part of their clique. Ryan did his best to ignore both. In his heart, he was a Philly kid, from the city where dreams were asphalt gutters and dry jokes.

He threw himself into his work that year, burying his head in his studies, and hoping things would be settled when he emerged.

By his senior year, they seemed to be. A few friends stuck with him, the teachers had stopped trying to contort themselves giving him passing grades… it was back to normal, or at least as normal as an heir to the empire that was Burns Worldwide Consolidated could be.

...

Ryan walked between his fathers, unable to suppress the grin that spread across his face. He'd traded his wool suit for a letterman jacket and jeans, much more comfortable in the later afternoon weather. As they walked, he rambled on about hid final semester, exchanging stories with Monty Burns. Burns was not his biological father, but he couldn't bring himself to think of the man as his step-father. That seemed too distant, and fraught with stigma. It was easier just to say "fathers," and leave it at that.

Anyone watching the family of three would've ben easily able to identify Ryan's blood father: the two men looked quite similar, with the same rounded faces, soft cheekbones, and deep eyes. True, Ryan's were hazel, and his air was black in contrast to his father's brown eyes and ash-grey, but the resemblance was strong enough to show a clear patrimony.

Waylon had been preoccupied during the late afternoon, spending more time on his cell phone than he would've liked, handling business several time zones away on in Springfield, North Tacoma.

"It looks like we're going to have to cut this trip short, sir," Waylon remarked, shoving his phone back into the pocket of his jeans. "Good help is so hard to find these days. If we head back tonight, we might be able to keep things from getting out of control."

Ryan paused, running his fingers over the collar of his jacket. "I… uh, I haven't exactly finished packing," he confessed.

Waylon raised his eyebrows. "You said you were ready."

"I said I was _mostly_ ready," Ryan corrected. "We don't have to be out of the dorms till Tuesday, so I figured I'd pack tomorrow."

"How 'mostly ready' are you?" Waylon asked, knowing he'd immediately regret the question.

Ryan folded his arms petulantly. "I have still have to put my books in their shipping boxes, clear out my dresser, desk and closet. But aside from that-"

Waylon rubbed the bridge of his nose, just above his glasses. "So, what exactly have you packed?"

Ryan shuffled his feet. "Well, I've got a list and the boxes ready."

"Angels and ministers of grace preserve me. You haven't started packing at all."

Ryan appeared on the verge of reply when Burns stepped in between them. "Smithers," he began in his most soothing voice. "Young Ryan can hardly be to blame if our plans have changed. I'd expected to spend at least a few days out here, enjoying the wonderful New Haven air. That salty tang of the Atlantic takes me back to my youth. I, for one, am reluctant to abridge this nostalgic sojourn."

"We can't afford to both be gone too long, Monty."

Burns gave his husband a condescending smirk. "Then take the jet back yourself, if you're inclined to be such a wet blanket. Ryan here is in no shape to depart yet, and I am disinclined myself. I'm more than capable of facilitating my own arrangements without your anxious hovering."

"I can pack quickly," Ryan started to interject, but Burns cut him off with a wave.

"Hush. I won't hear any more on the matter. The old girl needs a grip on the wheel as it is, and alas it seems your father is the one who must lay his hands upon her. Though, I must confess it concerns me to think what might come." Burns' expression took on an only somber cast. He gave Waylon a knowing look, laced with implication. " _Neither_ of us are getting any younger in the matter."

"Fine, fine," Waylon relented. "I'll take the jet. But call me, text me if you run into any trouble. I can contract a jet out here in a pinch."

Burns smiled innocently, tenting his fingers. "My dear Waylon, I believe you'll find that quite unnecessary. Ryan and I shall see you back in Springfield then."

Waylon rolled his eyes, but Ryan caught the affectionate twinkle as his father shook his head at the old man. "As long as that's okay with Ryan, it's okay with me."

Ryan gave a thumbs up. "It is dad. I've got this. You worry too much about me," he added as Waylon pulled him into a full embrace.

"Your father is a worrywart by nature, Ryan," Burns said from the background, "but even I've grown fond of his overbearing ministrations. To be most frank, they've grown endearing over the years." He stepped in as Waylon released Ryan, and wrapped his arms around Waylon's hips. "Take care, old friend. We will be seeing you shortly. Why, in less than three days' time I expect to be in your arms once again. Be sure to keep things from falling into utter pandemonium while I'm gone, will you?"

Waylon hugged him back. "Of course, Monty. I've got everything under control."

Burns gave Waylon an affectionate prod in the chest. "There's that capable man I've come to rely on." He threw an arm about Ryan's shoulder. "Your young lad and I shall have a smashing good time, the kind of comradery only two old Yalies might know, eh boy? What say we get your lodgings packed post haste, so we might be on our own voyage?"

Ryan gave his father Waylon one last reassuring look. "Don't worry, Dad! I'll be home soon; promise!"

...

Monty Burns sat on the bed of Ryan's shared dormitory room as the young man hastily shoved his belongings into shipping boxes. He didn't offer to help, nor did Ryan ask him to. Ryan was glad to have a moment of peace. His roommate, Chapler, hadn't wasted any time in leaving right after graduation.

Ryan had the room to himself, and Burns, as he worked.

It didn't take the young man long. Despite not having officially started his packing till that evening, Ryan had already sorted most his clothes and textbooks. He'd made arrangements for a moving company to pick everything up the following day and bring it back to Springfield, where he'd sort things at a more leisurely pace.

He brushed a strand of his soft black hair out of his face and stared at a handful of papers from one of his courses. A smattering of letter grades stared back. Ryan briefly debated keeping them, before concluding he'd never need his old tests again, and tossed them into the garbage bag in the middle of the floor.

Throughout Ryan's progress, Burns said nothing. He sat, staring out the window, lost in his own thoughts. Ryan appreciated the quiet.

Ryan threw a few more papers into the garbage bag, made one last check of his desk drawers, then straightened up. "I think that's it," he said, gesturing to the boxes along the wall. "I packed my travel bag yesterday, so I'll have a few things to wear until the rest of this gets back." He gave a box a tap with his foot.

The sky was darkening rapidly, but not quite night.

Burns shook himself, as if waking from a dream. "Come again, Ryan?"

The young man repeated himself, and Burns gave a grunt of acknowledgement.

"Your father made arrangements for our lodging and board tonight, but I've changed the pickup location for your Durango."

Ryan cocked his head. "Wait, why?"

"I thought we might enjoy a trip back at our leisure, two fine Yalies. I look forward to regaling you with of tales from my youth on these hallowed grounds. Then tomorrow, I have an agenda for you."

Ryan tilted his head. "Me? Why me?"

"We're going to drive down to the coast, not particularly far. Why, scarcely a stone's throw from Stratford. From there, we'll make our flight."

Ryan tilted his head. "I didn't know there was an airport down there."

Burns pursed his lips and steepled his fingers. "Hmmm, a small one. But it will suffice for our needs. Come Ryan, we'll take our belongings to the quarters your father most graciously procured, then, I hope you'll indulge me this trip down memory lane. It's been too long since I strolled along HIllhouse Avenue under the night sky."

Ryan grabbed his camping backpack, and slung it over one shoulder. It was larger than his bookbag, offering more space for clothes and his shaving kit. He'd packed light, a few pairs of socks, underwear, a sweater, basic essentials. He knew he still had a good amount of clothes back at his home in Springfield, but it never hurt to be prepared for a change of weather, he reasoned. On more than one occasion he'd left balmy Springfield to find himself touching down at the tail-end of an early east-coast freeze, or vice versa.

He zipped his jacket up against the cool air, and followed Monty Burns.

The man hadn't forgotten the layout of the college, a town itself in many ways. He led Ryan along the narrow one-way street of Hillhouse Ave, following up a gentle rise. Despite his age, he moved with a remarkably brisk pace, and Ryan found himself stretching his legs to keep up.

Though the road was narrow, the avenue itself was a broad thoroughfare, with wide grassy curbs and old trees that arched over them. Classical mansions, small by comparison to massive edifice of Burns Manor lined the way, giving rise to the name "Hill house." Their immaculately maintained yards were safely bordered by wrong iron fences.

Ryan had walked this way before, when heading from his residence hall to the so-known Science Hill. At Sachem Street, the avenue ended. Burns gave a cursory look for cars before crossing and sitting down on the stone wall of a terraced quad beyond. Ryan sat beside him. He'd indulged Burns' nostalgia, and listened to stories he'd heard many times before. His head was still spinning from the day's events, and he was only half listening until Burns added something he'd never mentioned before.

"I departed for Oxford shortly after I graduated from this fine institution, and I wasn't ever intending to return. I must confess it is my dearest wish you don't do the same."

Ryan picked up an old acorn and rolled it between his fingers; a survivor from last fall that somehow managed to go unburied over the winter. He tossed it into a bed of tulips.

"What, you don't want me following in your footsteps?" Ryan teased.

Burns gave a knowing smile. "Oh, to a degree I'm anticipating it, but not to the full depth and breadth of my experiences. It is my hope that you return to Springfield permanently, and make the town your home."

Ryan made a face. "I hadn't really given much thought about what I wanted to do next. I was considering going for my Master's, but I'm not even sure what major I'd pursue."

They watched as the light changed, and several cars of students with their parents rolled past. Ryan caught a glimpse of a woman that reminded him a bit too much of his mother. A trick of the streetlights, he thought. Nothing more. His heart knew he was correct.

Ryan realized he was exhausted. Not just physically, but mentally. The emotional high that he'd been riding all afternoon since the final graduation speech had fled without a parting goodbye, leaving him weary and almost numb.

He put his elbows on his legs and hunched over, chin resting in his hands. He watched the light turn again. Several students trotted across the street in ones and twos, occasionally threes. The cars waited patiently.

Exhaling slowly, Ryan turned to face Burns. "I'm not ready to think about that right now. Honestly, Monty, I think I just want to get back to the hotel and go to bed."

"The evening is young," Burns remarked, down at the illuminated mansions. "But then again so are you, my boy. For this, I can agree. We shall retrieve your car from the lot tomorrow. Is there any comestible that might satisfy your needs before we retire?"

Ryan stared at him blankly.

"Food, boy! Do you wish to eat?"

Ryan shook his head. "No, I'm too tired to eat," he confessed as he made to stand. Burns was already on his feet, offering a gaunt hand to Ryan. It was as much symbolic as helpful, Ryan had little doubt that Burns could've hardly helped pull him to his feet. Nevertheless, Ryan took it gratefully as he pushed himself up. "Thanks, Monty."

"One Yalie to another," Burns remarked with odd cheerfulness. He wrapped his scarf tighter around his neck and tucked his hands into the pockets of his long coat.

"Do you need something to eat?" Ryan asked as they walked at a more leisurely pace back towards the heart of the city. Ryan was glad to be walking downhill. However slight the grade, it was better than up. His legs felt heavy, weak. He was grateful for Burns' reassurance that he'd manage his own meals. Ryan wasn't sure he would've been able to stay awake for dinner.

They crossed the lobby of their modern hotel, took an elevator up to their respective rooms, and parted ways.

Ryan barely remembered getting ready for bed.

He definitely did not remember falling asleep.

...

Ryan Smithers woke to a gentle tapping at his door, and Burns' voice from outside. "Ryan, are you up yet?"

Ryan glanced at the clock on the nightstand. It was nearly noon! He'd slept for over twelve hours.

No wonder I feel rested, he thought as he put on his glasses. "I'm up, Monty," he called.

"Good, good," the old man replied from the hall. "I thought you'd slipped into some ineludible torpor; or worse, departed without me. Please make haste in getting ready. I shall await your company downstairs post-haste."

"Fine, fine," Ryan huffed.

There was no response, not that he was entirely expecting one.

Ryan took a quick shower, shaved, and combed his hair. He threw on the same jeans and long-sleeved tee-shirt that he'd been wearing the day before. They looked clean, _smelled_ clean, passed his informal inspection.

Downstairs, Burns was waiting for him, reclining in a deep leather couch. Burns gestured to a seat nearby, beckoning Ryan to sit. Ryan grabbed a donut and a cup of coffee from the breakfast bar, then sat down across from the old man. "I'm surprised you let me sleep this long."

Burns made a dismissive gesture. "I had some matters to attended to that didn't require your presence. It seemed pointless to interrupt your repose. However, now we need to pick up the pace. Our flight is prepped, and I've but a narrow window of time we can be cleared for takeoff."

Burns didn't wait for a response. He took the small overnight bag he'd brought, handed it to Ryan, and pointed to Ryan's own backpack. "Gather those up, and let us go."

"What's the hurry?" Ryan grumbled. "Can't we just take a later flight?"

Burns gave him an exasperated look. " _Dear_ boy, we are taking my _plane_. Not some commercial airline, and not the personal jet to which you may have become overly accustomed to."

Perplexed, but still not fully awake, he and Burns crossed to the student parking district. Ryan popped the hatch of the Durango, tossing his bag in, and setting Burns' smaller one beside it. "Care to tell me where we're going?" he asked as he slid into the driver's seat.

"I shall direct you. I think you're going to be pleasantly surprised by all this."

* * *

Ryan Smithers followed the directions of one C. Montgomery Burns who seemed to know the back roads and side streets with unerring familiarity. They followed the Connecticut coast west, past river mouths and coastlands, until they came to a small airport in the middle of a salty marshland peninsula.

The land was barely above sea-level, clearly artificially filled in many parts. Burns instructed Ryan to drive around an outer loop, ignoring the main gate. They turned onto an access road that wound around the back of the runways, just outside the security fence. Like the airport itself, the road was built up, a causeway that cut through the briny marshes on a berm of crushed rock and asphalt.

The wet tang of the ocean filled Ryan's nostrils.

A wide canal seemed to have been dredged from the marsh, coming up to the edge of a large, squat, grey-green building just beyond the airport fields. Ryan drove the Durango up to the building at Burns' instruction, and turned off the engine.

Ryan could see his initial assessment of the canal had been inaccurate. The building, resembling a massive hanger, was built up over the water, the canal passing beneath a set of wide doors, and into the building itself.

Ryan climbed out of the Durango and pushed his glasses up on his nose. "What is this place, Monty?"

Burns gave him a look of false innocence. "Why, dear boy, I thought it would be obvious. This is a hanger, and where we will pick up my plane."

The hanger was broad, with a curving roof, set on a slab on concrete with a channel for the canal down the center. The building was easily a hundred and twenty feet wide, the canal itself was probably at least a hundred. It hadn't looked so wide from the car. The hanger was largely windowless, made of corrugated steel; purely utilitarian, and painted to blend in to the surrounding environment, though no amount of camouflage could've concealed the size. The paint merely minimized the visual impact of the structure.

Over the canal was the main door, bifold-style, and designed to close just at water level. The staining along the trim showed where storm tides had reached up, and left their mark. Despite this, there was remarkably little sign of rust or corrosion.

A man in a pair of grey overalls stood by a side door, watching them with a patient expression.

Burns held up his hand, indicating Ryan was to stay, and walked over. A few words were exchanged, the Ryan couldn't hear anything above the soft whistle of wind through the dune grass. After a minute, Burns raised his hand and made a 'come here,' motion. "Get our bags too, and anything else you need from your Durango, my boy. We shan't be returning to it."

"I'm getting it back, right?" Ryan called out as he shouldered his pack.

"Of course! Did I not say I'd have it shipped to Springfield at my expense?"

If Burns had said that, Ryan didn't remember, but it didn't matter. He locked the car, pocket his key, and hurried over to Burns who was already entering the building.

Ryan ducked in through the door, eager to be out of the cold air, and gasped in shock.

Inside the hanger, a massive four-propeller pontoon aircraft hung above the canal, hammocked in wide, nylon Swiss-straps. Several attendants scurried about the hanger, doing Ryan could only imagine what.

The plane itself looked like something straight out of a World War Two documentary. The long fuselage ended in wide twin-tail, wide and broad. The wings were likewise wide, each supporting two massive tri-blade propeller engines.

The purpose of the canal was now obvious to Ryan. Mounted on each wing was a massive pontoon, each nearly nearly half as long as the aircraft itself.

The craft was a silvery, aluminum color, except for the tail fins. Those appeared to have been hastily painted over in black, thought Ryan thought he could just make out a hint of red around the edges.

There was a deep thrum and several synchronized engines whirred to life. Ryan watched as the Swiss strap system slowly lowered the aircraft into the water. Technicians scurried, detaching them from the far side. The straps were drawn back, retracting into rolled housing. Ryan could see two men already in the craft, checking systems, energizing the electrical circuits. They must've climbed in from the catwalks above while it had still been suspended aloft. There was a loud clang as fuel lines connected, the chug of pumps as the tanks were filled.

"Blohm und Voss," Burns explained, answering Ryan's unspoken question. "Ha 139 variant." He walked over to the edge of the canal, and reached out towards the wing. The tips of his fingers just barely brushed the smooth skin. He smiled fondly. "I haven't seen her in far too long. It'll be good to get her in the air again."

Ryan sidled up next to him, adjusting his backpack. "Wait, we're flying back home… in that?!"

Burns turned towards him, expression mildly annoyed. "Did you think we would just flap our arms, or perhaps click our heels together three times?"

"No! But… that thing looks like it hasn't been flown since the war!"

Burns growled softly. "Your assessment is largely accurate, but not completely. Technically, she was last flown at the end of the war. It was inside this magnificent bird that I was able to return to this fine country, my most loyal attendant at my side. Stripping her of all armaments, we made it across the Atlantic on a wing and a prayer. We were running on fumes when I set her down along the Potomac outside of Washington, D.C." His eyes traced the plane, remembering.

"Of course when all was said and done, the Smithsonian offered to take her off my hands for their collection, but I couldn't part with this faithful companion. I declined their offer, and against their wishes, I refueled. I relocated her here for safe keeping until such a time as I might need her again. I think this is as good a time as any, don't you?"

"She can still fly?"

Burns glared at Ryan, clearly annoyed. "Did I not just answer that?"

Ryan kicked the ground, watching the plane bob in the canal. "Yes, but… that was a long time ago."

"Time can be meaningless," Burns replied. "You'll understand, some day."

...

The cockpit was small, cramped, but Ryan found the seat surprisingly comfortable. His backpack, and Burns' small travel kit were strapped in the small crew compartment behind them. Compared to the cockpit of the private jet Burns owned, this seemed remarkably simple and minimalistic. There was a control yolk, obviously. Pedals in the foot-well for, a few levers in a central console that Ryan assumed were throttle controls, and only a few dials and indicators.

Burns sat in the pilot's seat across from him, wearing a leather flight jacket, gloves, and scarf. He'd offered Ryan the same. Something the young man declined.

 _I could practically fly this thing!_ Ryan thought, looking at the simple design.

"I might let you try your hand at the yolk," Burns replied, as if Ryan had spoken aloud. He put on a headset, and passed one over to Ryan.

Ryan slipped it on, tightening it. The lambskin-lined ear muffs blocked out a good deal of sound. Ryan watched, intrigued and with a vague apprehension as Burns communicated to the flight crew with a series of hand-signals. At a thumbs-up from them, he hit the ignition.

One by one, the massive Jumo 205 diesel engines fired up with a roar and a belch of sooty smoke. After a second or two, the tempo evened out, the smoke dissipating as the plane slowly idled out of the hanger. The door was just barely wide enough for the plane to pass through, but Burns directed it with an artist's hand. They bobbed on the canal for a moment, while Burns barked a series of numbers and phrases over a radio. The crackling voice from the control tower came back.

After a minute, they were cleared for take-off.

"Ryan," Burns ordered. "Push the throttle to full, and pull back on the yolk with me when I tell you too. She's a stiff bird, and requires two hands for takeoff."

Ryan nodded, gripping the yolk with one hand, reaching for his side of the throttle with the other.

"On my mark." Burns navigated to the center of the canal. Ryan realized now whay it seemed so long and straight. An aquatic runway, sheltered from the Atlantic waves by the jutting sand and marshlands. The water glistened in the sun, almost flat, save for the wake from the wind of the propellers.

"Bravo whiskey charlie one-eight-eight-one, you are cleared for take-off. Have a good safe flight."

"Now!" Burns shoved the throttles forward, Ryan lending his own strength, and leaned back on the yolk with all his strength. Ryan pulled the 'U' of his yolk back, watching Burns out of the corner of his eye.

The aircraft responded almost at once. With a roar, the massive engines cycled up to full revolutions, throwing them back against their seats. Burns held the controls steady as the plane churned down the canal, a river of swirling brackish water in their wake. The plane bumped once, then twice as it caught over a few small waves, then evened out as the pontoons lifted into the air.

They climbed quickly, the coastline rapidly shrinking below. Ryan felt his ears pop, and with a start that the cabin was probably not well pressurized, if at all. He yawned his jaw, trying to relieve the pressure in his head. In another ten minutes or so, they leveled out, Burns relaxed the throttle, set a northwestern course. The altimeter read 7,000 feet. Their cruising speed was a leisurely one hundred twenty-five miles per hour.

Ryan shivered, wishing he'd put on the warmer flight suit. He tried to do the math in his head, estimating how long he'd have to endure the dry chill.

"There's a second bomber jacket, scarf, and set of gloves in the back. That wall crate," Burns gestured to the small hold. "Go get them, Ryan. I can handle her from here. If you find yourself still cold, there are several wool blankets as well. You can make a bivouac back there for a spell until you've acclimated."

"I'm fine," Ryan lied, pulling on the leather jacket, relishing the warmth from the lambskin liner. He slipped the gloves on, and pulled the scarf around his neck. "So, the jacket is not just fashion," he noted as he returned to the copilot's seat.

"In all things, one must still look good. One can always combine form and function in the name of style," replied Burns. "So, tell me Ryan, would you like to learn how to fly?"

...

They cut their way north, crossing over the edge of western New York, and into Canadian airspace. Burns explained it was easiest this way. The Blohm und Voss was night a high-altitude aircraft, but it was long range. Flying over Canada would keep them out of the major metropolitan areas, and avoid complications with commercial airspace. "Sometimes, on rare occasion, dear buy, an international flight plan is easiest," Burns noted from the spot where he lounged in the cargo hold.

Ryan grinned, banking slightly. The Blohm und Voss was as easy to fly as he'd thought. Well, at least when it was already in the air and pointed on a planned course. He read the dials, adjusting slightly for the wind. Directions were displayed on a compass, a full 360-degree bevel and Burns had showed him which numbers to keep the nose to. Then he went to lie down on a rude bunk made of crates and the coarse blankets.

Ryan didn't mind Burns' absence. The plane practically flew itself as long as Ryan paid some attention to the direction and indicators.

While Burns rested, Ryan rummaged under the seat and found an old trip log, something Burns must've left from his last flight. Most of the pages had been torn out, but there were a few still remaining, brittle and yellow with age. A few notes were written in what appeared to be German, but when Ryan tried to translate it, he discovered it seemed to be some sort of code. The words made no sense. Perplexed, Ryan set the book on Monty's empty seat, and watched the endless sea of wilderness pass below. It was relaxing, almost hypnotic. He yawned, feeling his eyelids grow sleepy.

Ryan willed his head up, jerking slightly. A moment later, his head dipped towards his chest once again. The seat was comfortable, and through the muffs the thrum of the engines was almost soothing. No, he thought, forcing his mind to focus. He would not fall asleep at the controls.

A firm hand wrapped around his shoulder.

Ryan gave a yelp, startled, his knees knocking against the yolk as he did. Quickly he corrected his error, and looked up to find Burns standing beside him. The old man's blue eyes were surprisingly kind.

"That is why, my dear boy, we always had two pilots on long flights." Burns scooped the log book off his seat and sat down, glancing up at the sun that had moved steadily west. "A crew of four was ideal in these crafts, but Johan and I didn't have the luxury. It took us nearly thirty hours to fly across the Atlantic, and we slept in shifts. I trusted that man with my life. Obviously."

Ryan looked down. "I'm sorry I almost fell asleep."

"Don't be," Burns replied with a shrug. "I had my eye on you the entire time. You were never in any real danger of nodding off. Now, my young lad, why don't you retire to the bunk in the hold. Rest for a spell. I can attend to the duties of flight for the next several hours at least."

"You don't have to tell me twice," Ryan replied, gratefully.

He squeezed his way from the co-pilot's seat into the cramped space beyond, and lay down on the blankets, still warm from Burns' body.

He didn't intent to fall asleep.

He couldn't manage to stay awake.


	2. Chapter 2

**"As a man tramps the woods...**

 **He can stand on a rock by the shore and be in a past he could not have known,** **in a future he will never see.**

 **He can be a part of time that was and time yet to come."**

William Chapman White

* * *

 **"Ryan! Get up here and get your seatbelt on!"**

Through the fog of sleep Ryan's brain clawed itself awake. There was an urgency to Burns' voice, a hint of panic under his usually calm demeanor. Ryan grabbed his glasses off the rigging beside him. He swung himself over the center control console into his seat.

Ryan couldn't see anything in front of them, save for reflection of the console lights on the interior of the windows, and the moon off to the west: a fat crescent arc scythed against the black backdrop.

Burns' brow was knit in concentration, his already narrow face drawn tight in concentration.

"What's wrong?" Ryan asked, fasting the harness across his chest.

Burns flipped several toggle switches and eased the yolk forward. "We're losing altitude," he replied, eyes never leaving the window. "I can see a lake up ahead. I'm going to try and set her down on it. I need you to be prepared for a potentially rough landing."

Ryan leaned forward in his seat, to the extent that his harness would allow. He tried to block the console light with his hand. "How can you tell that."

Burns extended a long, narrow finger and pointed. "Observe the light below and ahead? Reflections of our traveling moon. By my estimate, that stretch of water shall serve us the space for an impromptu landing. It's my intent to circle so we're inbound lengthwise, to maximize our landing strip." He angled the yolk to the side, feet on the pedals, and Ryan heard as much as felt the plane respond. There was a change in the engines' roar as the massive aircraft banked slowly to the right.

The moon crossed the window, and Ryan could finally see the area Burns was talking about.

It hardly looked large enough.

Ryan leaned against the force of the craft, trying to catch a better glimpse as it passed out of view. Burns' eyes flicked toward the chronometer, then the speedometer. He began counting off seconds, voice barely audible over the whine of the propellers. Counting, measuring distance through time and speed.

The moon was somewhere to the side now, out of sight. Ryan glanced at the compass, trying to get a sense of bearings.

At just over ten seconds, Burns through the plane into a hard left, hurling his body against the yolk. He strained against the seatbelt. With an annoyed snarl he unhooked it, and pushed his entire weight against the controls.

With a whine and a shudder the plane followed his commands, metal skin groaning as the aged joints tried to handle the stress of his maneuver. At the same time, the aircraft gave a terrifying lurch.

The nose dropped.

Ryan felt his stomach rise. It settled somewhere in his chest.

"Do you want me to do anything?!" he yelled over the cabin noise.

"Just… hold… on," Burns answered though his clenched teeth.

The plane continued to drop and twist, then Ryan saw it: the lake, now clearly illuminated from behind. East, they were heading east! From this angle, it looked easily long enough to handle them.

The plane was low now, just skimming the treetops. Ryan could see the swirl of motion. Burns struggled to hold the plane steady, threading a delicate balance of altitude and speed. Too slow or low, and he'd clip the trees. Too high, too fast, and they'd overshoot the lake into the forest beyond. Beads of sweat had broken out across his forehead, but he didn't dare release his hands to wipe them away.

A single trickle made its way down across his cheek. He ignored it.

They were over the water now, Burns leaning to see out the side window, gauging altitude off the reflection.

"Precision," he muttered as he dropped the plane, threw the throttle down, and pulled back on the yolk. There was a rattling scream as the flaps along the trailing wing edges rose, increasing surface area and drag. The engines, cycling just above idle, provided little power for lift. The plane dropped.

Ryan had time to see the reflections of the running lights against the surface of the water, like bits of shattered glass in red and green. The leading edges of the pontoons hit the surface with shocking roughness, bouncing the plane back into the air like a skipped stone.

Burns snarled out some profanity that Ryan couldn't hear over the blood pounding in his own ears. He felt them lurch sideways, as the plane started to roll. The left pontoon struck the surface of the water, and dug in, throwing them both sideways.

Restrained by his harness, Ryan had just enough time to see the edge of the forest rushing past sideways before the forward edge of the right pontoon hit, caught, and slammed them straight. Ryan's head rebounded off the side window with a sickening crack, and he remembered nothing more.

* * *

Ryan Hall Smithers, son of Waylon and Lydia, had no idea how long he'd been unconscious.

He was however aware of the splitting pain in his head.

 _It's like I had one bitch of a migraine, and that bitch gave birth to a bunch of little baby migraines_ , he thought as flexed his arms carefully. The world seemed to be swaying slightly. He felt physically ill. He opened his eyes, then wondered if perhaps they were still shut, for the world seemed just as black either way.

After a moment, he became aware that the rocking motion was not in his head. There was a slight, but constant push and pull beneath him. As the buzzing in his head quieted, he could hear the gentle sound of waves lapping against an aluminum hull. In any other context, it would be a soothing and pleasant sound; but here, it was anything but.

Ryan tried to sit up, and found himself restrained. He struggled, disorientated for a moment before collapsing back into his seat.

"Where the fuck...?" he groaned. Stiffly, he reached up and rubbed his throbbing head. There was a sizeable welt forming on the right side of his skull. _That explains the headache_ , he thought with a wince.

There was no blood, no sign of outward trauma. Ryan had been in enough fist fights in his younger years to know the difference between a solid hit, and a potential concussion. This, mercifully, was the former.

"I would kill for an ice pack right now," he groaned, realizing his glasses had been knocked off. "Did anyone get the number of that bus that hit me?" he asked.

No one answered.

He wasn't expecting one.

What had happened? It was starting to come back to him slowly. Yale, graduation. His father left early. He was getting a flight back with Monty. There'd been a crash-

Monty!

Ryan's flailed at the buckle for his harness for a moment, then finally found the release. He floundered sideways across the central console, indifferent to the levers that jabbed into his ribs. He felt something cool, soft. The leather of Burns' jacket.

Headache temporarily forgotten in a surge of adrenaline, Ryan reached into his pocket and pulled out his cell phone. The small light illuminated the cramped cockpit.

Montgomery Burns was slumped against the left side of the cockpit, one arm thrown against the control panel, the other tangled at an unnatural angle through the yolk. His eyes were closed, face even paler than usual. Blood had dried of his head, a raw and clotting gash across his left temple.

"Hey, Monty." Ryan nudged Burns' arm. The man didn't move.

Nervously, Ryan reached up and laid his fingers across Burns' neck, worried for what he might find. Burns' pulse beat slow but steady beneath his skin. Ryan exhaled in relief and leaned back. He pushed himself up, careful not to bump the old man. What was one of the first things he'd learned in his high school first aid class; don't move the victim or something like that? Unless they were in imminent danger, of course.

Phone clutched in his hand, Ryan shoved the hatch of the aircraft open and looked out. The tiny LED barely illuminated the night world beyond.

Ryan swung himself down onto the pontoon, and checked his phone. No bars. He held it up, panning left then right, hoping against hope for a signal.

"Come on," he whispered, feeling his temper rise with each passing second.

His please went unanswered.

" ** _FUCK!_** "

With an animalistic scream of frustration Ryan hurled his phone away into the night.

A second later he immediately regretted his decision.

He swore again, softly this time, sliding down against the cool skin of the pontoon, tucking his legs up, Turkish-style, as Burns' called it. He put his head in his hands, letting the darkness surround him.

...

One of the strange things about both the wilderness, and vision in general, is the under-appreciation most give to the former… and the over-reliance they place on the latter.

Ryan Smithers never had sat like this before, alone in the blackness, in the middle of a Canadian forest, with nothing but his own thoughts for company.

At first the silence seemed absolute, the night as opaque as night.

As he sat, Ryan found himself becoming aware that the world was anything but. As he sat, face buried in his palms, the nighttime world opened up, painting itself in his mind's eye.

In the distance, he heard the soft trill of small frogs along the shoreline. A chorus of high-pitched soprano peeps and trills, which gave him a sense of the lake's boundary. At times a deeper trill would ring out, adding a depth to the amphibians' concert. He smelled the scent of fresh water, but on the breeze the wet earth beyond. He could see the marshlands they called their home. And beyond that, the tree line of the forest.

Somewhere in the woods, an owl called, wispy voice singing forth eight notes. It sounded as if he were asking a question. Even deeper, came an answering call. His mate, or perhaps an adversary, asking the same eight-worded line.

From the other side of the lake, a low call began, rising in pitch to a haunting, flutelike call that trailed off at the end. A wolf? Ryan felt the hairs on the back of his neck prickle.

No, he thought as the call repeated itself and he listened to the echoes. It's over the water. Some night bird making its rounds across the lake, under the night sky.

Ryan felt the slight rocking of the plane as it bobbed in the water, became aware that the tail section seemed to shift more. He heard the faint _splish_ of tiny waves against the shoreline, the faint grind of the pontoons on sand. In his mind, he saw the beach they'd run aground on. Across the water, he heard the noise of a jumping fish. A soft, delicate sound as it must've grabbed some insect from the still water's surface.

...

When Ryan finally raised his head, and opened his eyes, he was shocked to discover how small the world suddenly became. The noises seemed to fade, the motion of the plane and the scents of water, woods, and soil, while still there took second place.

Ryan also realized the world was not as dark as he'd first perceived. Without the artificial glare of his phone dulling his eyes, his pupils had widened and adapted to the dim landscape. Under the light of the crescent moon, he saw the outline of the trees against the sky, the weeds at the water's edge, the wide swath of sandy beach they'd come to rest upon. The stars added their own light, not to be outshone by the moon. Ryan tilted his head back, open-mouthed in awe.

He'd never seen anything like it before!

Growing up in the city, Ryan knew there were stars in the night sky, though from Philadelphia he rarely saw them. Most nights the sky was a dull orange glow from the lights of the city reflecting up. The sky around Yale was similar; so many lights that the night sky was muted.

At Burns Manor, set atop Mammon hill and secluded as it was from the rest of Springfield, Ryan had his first true sense of the night sky.

Even that paled in comparison to this!

The stars shown down, glittering like crushed diamonds against a dark blue backdrop. It was blue, he realized, not black like he'd always assumed. And stretching through it all, the trailing arm of the Milky Way; a swath of stardust made from the faint light of a thousand suns lifetimes beyond his own.

It took his breath away.

In that moment, Ryan had his first glimpse of the cosmic scale, and the tiny part of his role in it.

"Whoa…" he breathed, reluctant to even look away.

Ryan could've spent all night there, hypnotized by the siren song of the great beyond, were it not for the beginning tingle in his legs. His feet were starting to fall asleep.

With a grunt, he unfolded himself and stood up, wiping his hands on the sleeves of his pants. He had responsibilities. With one last look at the night sky, he hauled himself into the plane.

The hold was darker than the world outside. Ryan groped along the wall till he found the storage crates. He fumbled with the latches, working by touch alone. The wool blankets were where he remembered them, a large stack. Carefully, he draped them over Monty Burns to keep the old man warm against the night air.

The blankets from his nest were still on the floor. He'd use those for himself. He wasn't sure how much sleep he'd manage to get, but there was nothing more he could do tonight.

Ryan pushed a roll under his head, and closed his eyes.


	3. Chapter 3

**_In wilderness I sense the miracle of life,_**

 ** _and behind it our scientific accomplishments fade to trivia._**

 _Charles Lindbergh_

* * *

Ryan Smithers didn't sleep much that night, or if he did, it was an utterly dreamless sleep that seemed to linger on and on. Sometime that morning, before the first hints of light had even begun to creep into the eastern sky, some small songbird woke up and began to serenade the darkness.

His voice was soon joined by several others, a veritable orchestra of pitches and patterns that rose to booming crescendo as the sun's rays broke over the horizon. Ryan rolled on his side, pushing himself up, surprised by the fact he was not as stiff or exhausted as he'd expected. He didn't feel rested exactly, but it was better than no sleep at all. He stretched, and rubbed his hands briskly over his face.

The interior of the plane gave testimony to the fact last night's crash had not been a dream.

With a groan, he pushed himself to his feet and slouched up to the cockpit to check on Burns.

The old man was as Ryan had left him, wrapped in blankets and unmoving. Ryan checked Burns' pulse again, and found the steady beat reassuring.

In the growing daylight, Ryan was able to better inspect Burns' injuries. He had a laceration across the left side of his head to just above his eye, a gash where his crepe paper-like skin had torn against a window bolt. It was superficial at least.

Ryan knew how much head wounds could bleed, but this appeared to have clotted and well over night. The blood had dried along his head and face, leaving maroon tracks on his pale skin.

It was Burns' left arm that worried Ryan the most. In the crash, it had become wedged through the handles of the yolk, and broken by the impact as Burns' body twisted against the controls of the plane.

Tentatively, Ryan reached out and touched Burns' left hand. The skin was warm, comparable to his right. Ryan took that as a good sign, assumed it meant no loss of circulation. Burns' fingers were likewise neither swollen nor blue, though a bruise was beginning to creep its way down his forearm towards his wrist.

Ryan pursed his lips, and pushed himself back into the hold. He started going through the storage trunks, looking for some manner of medical kit or bandages that he could use to splint Burns' arm. Back when he'd been a Boy Scout, he'd earned his first aid merit badge, but that had been nearly twenty years ago, and he certainly didn't remember everything. The hold was dim, but enough ambient light filtered in from the windshield that he could make out what he was doing.

He found two parachutes, and more than enough of the thin but strong line. He set them aside near the aft end of the compartment, and kept rummaging.

More survival blankets, a tool kit with an assortment of wrenches, screw drivers, and the like. A battery-powered flashlight and twelve-volt battery, the terminals long ago corroded beyond use. There was a mess kit of stackable pots, pans, and utensils.

Near the front of the cargo bunk, just behind his seat, he found what he was looking for. A heavy metal box with the familiar red cross in a white circle was easy to pick out amongst a heap of cans and silver-foil packets. The word _Verbandkasten_ stenciled above the cross.

He hauled it out set it on the floor of the hold. It was as heavy as it looked, and just as solid. He undid the two ancient clasps, and flipped the lid open. A musty, antiseptic smell greeted him. Ryan coughed, and fanned the air with his hand. It smelled like a hospital. At least that meant whatever was inside was probably still good, he reasoned. Ryan leaned over the box... and found himself immediately wishing he could read German.

The contents were foreign to his modern eyes. None of the neatly packaged Band-Aids in their own sterile pouches that he was accustomed to seeing. He pulled out several small bottles, some clear glass, others tinted brown to block out the light. The labels were yellowed with age, all in German. A mercury bulb thermometer, several small paper-wrapped packages of dressings, a rather large flat tin, and a red and white canister with the numbers 20 x 100 cm finished up the main supplies.

Ryan supposed the canister was probably gauze wrap. He'd need that for Burns' arm.

He pulled the flat tin box out and pried the lid off. Inside were several survival manuals, once again in German, a flint and steel, a compass with a cracked face (probably broken from colliding with the flint and steel), a large knife, and a small mirror with a hole in the center. Ryan had no idea what that was for. It was barely large enough to shave with. He set the mirror and survival kit aside, and leafed through the books, pointedly ignoring the image of a German eagle atop a Swastika on the cvers. The idea that these were Nazi supplies made Ryan uncomfortable.

He forced his mind away from the implications of history, and focused on the project at hand.

One book looked like it was basically _One Thousand and One Uses for a Parachute_. Though Ryan couldn't make out a word of the text, the diagrams showed the circular cloth being folded, cut, rolled. The pictures were easy to follow, showing the step-by-step process make a shelter, a carrying bag, just about anything really.

The second book was a military survival handbook. It had less pictures than the parachute book, and Ryan growled in frustration as he flipped through the brittle pages. At least there was a thorough section on first aid, with pictures he could use.

To split a broken arm, he'd need several rigid objects, and wrap to bind it. Though there was a picture that showed how to apply traction to set a fracture, Ryan was not at all confident in his ability to perform such an act. He'd heard stories during his Boy Scout days of people who had injured the victim further by attempting, and failing to set broken bones. One Scout Master recounted a tale of a man who had a major artery in his arm severed when a well-meaning, but poorly qualified hiker attempted to set his arm.

Keep the arm in the position you found it, as much as you're able, the Scout Master had said. If it's bent, do a bent sling. If it's straight, splint it straight. Your job isn't to be the doctor. Your job is to keep the victim from further injury until you get to proper medical care.

The book showed both types of splints.

Ryan looked at Burns' arm.

He'd have to bend it some, that would be unavoidable. No point in moving Burns until he had to, Ryan reasoned. Grabbing the survival knife, he pushed the hatch open, and dropped out onto the pontoon just as he had last night.

The world that greeted his eyes took his breath away. The rising sun shone over the trees, casting a yellow glow over everything. Ryan's shadow, still long, danced across the side of the plane, mottled by the reflecting sunbeams against the hull of the craft. The lake was calm, still, mirror-like. The water was a warm amber colour, not clear like Ryan had expected.

Just as he thought, the pontoons had come to rest hard against a golden beach, made of rough glacial sand. Ryan balanced his way across the ridge of the pontoon to the shore, and stepped down. The sand crunched under his feet. It was the same amber colour as the water, coarse; a mix of crushed quarts and granite.

The lake itself was hemmed in by shrubbery that must've recently leafed out. They still had that young, yellow-green hue of new growth. Beyond that, a sea of evergreen tree tops blurred into the distance.

Looking lengthwise down the lake, from the westerly direction they'd come, Ryan saw a distant marshy area, a clearing through the trees. An inlet, or maybe an outlet, where water flowed. Beyond the western tree-line he could make out the rise of mountains, jagged, snow-peaked, and faded blue by distance. He shivered, despite the warmth from the sun. Spring clearly came later here. The weather was several weeks behind. What would've been late May back at Yale was still only April here… wherever here was.

Something glinted up at him from the sand, a flash of light that caught Ryan's eye. He blinked, and made his way over, curious; then he laughed in surprise. It was his cellphone, mostly buried from the force with which he'd thrown it last night. Ryan pulled it out of the sand, shaking it off, careful not to scratch the screen.

Though the battery was nearly empty, it appeared none the worse for wear from its impromptu flight. "I guess I got lucky there," Ryan remarked to no one in particular.

For some reason, holding the little rectangular square gave him a sense of normality. He tucked it into the pockets of his jeans, and picked his way over the beach to the edge of the forest.

Unlike the beaches of the Atlantic, there was no gradual creeping from sand to soil. Here, it was as if a giant hoe had cut the land, dividing the gritty beach from the dark earth beyond. A stark boundary between one environment and the next.

The forest pushed itself as far as it could go against the shifting terrain. Several low bushes grew between the trees, scarcely more than knee height. They looked like the blueberry plants that grew in the rambles of Burns' estate.

Ryan didn't bother looking for berries.

Even if they were the same plant, or a wild variant thereof, it was still far too early in the season for blueberries.

As if on cue, Ryan's stomach rumbled.

He willed it to be silent.

He needed at least two smooth, straight branches, possibly three to make a brace for Burns' arm.

Pushing against undergrowth that seemed all too willing to fight back, Ryan turned his back on the lake, and plunged into the forests beyond.

...

Ryan was glad he'd brought the knife with him.

It wasn't a machete, but even sheathed it made a nice club to smack the scrub growth aside.

He forced his way against the forest, a tangled mat of narrow branches that seemed to reach out, snagging against his clothes, skin, and hair. At least once a stray limb threatened to snatch his glasses from his face. "Not today, Satan," Ryan muttered dryly, giving the shrub a whack with the hilt of his knife. The deeper he went, the darker the forest became, and the clearer the understory got.

Away from the lake, away from the open area it provided, plants struggled to get started on the shady forest floor. He was able to move quicker. Every few yards, Ryan turned and looked behind him, memorizing the way the woods looked, and keeping track of the sun's location. The last thing he wanted was to get lost.

It wasn't just the scenery that changed. Under the sheltering evergreens, the air was notably cooler and dryer. The damp, young scent of the lake had been replaced by an older almost primeval scent of spruce and balsam.

Ryan had in mind what he was looking for: three branches, each at least an inch wide, straight and smooth. He was hoping for something old and dry. The live branches of the conifers were too supple, to forgiving. They'd been as assuredly as the broken bones in Monty's arm would give. They wouldn't do at all.

Moving cautiously, Ryan finally came upon what he was looking for. The skeletal remains of some old deciduous tree that had long since died and come crashing down to the forest floor. The bark had fallen off the branches, leaving them pale and bare. _Bonewood_ , Ryan's brain decided to call it. A very apt description.

He unsnapped the leather sheath from the handle of his knife, and was delighted to discover the back of the knife was grooved with serrations. One side was the blade, obviously, but the back could double as a hand saw. He found several branches that gave him the width and length he was looking for, and set to work cutting.

Ryan was glad he didn't have to cut through a thick log. Though the saw blade was sharp, and the serrated teeth bit deep, the short length meant far more back-and-forth pulls than he was expecting. His forearm began to ache as a group muscles he rarely used fired up. At last, he had three sections of bonewood, each a bit longer than his own forearm. Shaking out his aching arms, Ryan sat on the fallen tree. He used the blade of the knife to whittle the ends round and smooth. _These'll do_ , he thought, holding the braces up. _That's the simple part. Now I'm going to have to move him_.

It would've been easy, Ryan noted, to sit here and do nothing. Procrastinate and wait for some _deus ex machina_ to give him direction or solve the problem for him. Maybe, if he listened long enough he'd hear the distinctive sound of a rescue helicopter cutting just over the tree tops. He strained his ears, willing the sound of rotors to appear in the distance.

God or _Deus_ , or whatever looked out for him did deign to intervene.

The only sounds were the rustle of evergreen needles in the breeze, the chirp of birdsong. Layers and layers of the same sound fading into the distance on all sides.

So much for silence, Ryan noted as he pushed himself up. His feet seemed loud against the forest sounds, a clumsy and heavy crunch against the whispers of the trees.

He made the short hike back to the crash site, hacking through the low scrub as he went.

The plane sat like some displaced silver bird, glaringly obvious yet small when compared to the vastness of the wilderness beyond. It was a touch of familiar and yet so alien. Perhaps what struck him the most was how quickly the natural world had already adapted to its presence. A pair of ducks sat on the trailing edge of the pontoon. A small flycatcher, or maybe it was a kingfisher, perched on the tip of the tailfin.

As he approached the ducks took off, leaping in to the water and paddling away, loudly quacking their disapproval at his presence.

"Yeah, yeah," Ryan muttered, climbing up the fuselage. He squinted for a moment, adjusting his eyes to the light. Carefully, using the knife, he cut several strips of cloth from one of the parachutes, coiling up the shroud lines as he went.

It looked like the supplies in the picture.

Anything else would have to rely on improvising.

Now came the hard part.

Ryan slid into the gap between the seats and lightly slapped Burns' cheek. "Hey, you going to wake up, old man?" he asked, trying to inject of bravado he most certainly didn't feel.

Burns didn't so much as twitch.

Ryan noted with a hint of distress that Burns' lips were dry, and starting to crack.

Of course, he realized as he regarded the unconscious man. It wasn't merely a potential neck injury or his broken arm that were the greatest threats to Montgomery Burns. Dehydration, Ryan realized. That would be the true killer.

Without medical attention and water, the man could easily die before help arrived. How long could a person live without water again? Something like three days? Four at most? Ryan couldn't remember exactly, but that seemed about right.

With a curse, Ryan shrank back, reconsidering.

He'd planned to split Burns' arm, then wait it out.

"We can't stay here too long, can we Monty? I don't know if you logged a flight plan, or how detailed you made it, but we might be waiting a long time until the Mounties or whoever find us."

Ryan looked at the pile of survival blankets, considering.

"I really hope you're as unconscious as you look, because this is going to hurt."

Standing behind Burns' seat, Ryan slid his hands under the man's armpits. He felt his heart pound against his ribs. "On the count of three," he said, squaring his stance. "One… two… three!"

With a grunt, he hauled Burns up and back, pulling the man's arm free from the yolk, and twisting the man's shoulders to drag him between the seats. It wasn't a graceful maneuver, but it was effective. Ryan set Burns down on the rolled blankets, then spun him around so his feet were facing downhill towards the tail. "We don't need all the blood going to your head, do we," Ryan huffed, wiping his face with the back of his hand. His brow was drenched in sweat.

It wasn't that Burns was particularly heavy. On the contrary the tail man was shockingly light. Ryan had seen his father lift Monty on several occasions. His father, Waylon, followed a rigorous workout regime. Ryan had been under the assumption it was his father's strength that allowed him to easily scoop Burns like a small child. Now he realized how truly frail the old man was.

"Shit," Ryan remarked as he laid Burns' arm as straight as he could and gently bound the bonewood splints in place. "You really aren't much more than skin and bones. We might not _have_ three days, really." He watched the rhythmic rise and fall of Burns' chest with each slow breath. "Just between you and I, I was hoping that you might actually wake during that. You're not playing possum, are you. I mean, I didn't think you were, but still, some response would've been nice."

Ryan sat down, his leg resting against Burns' good arm. "We're going to get you out of here. Get us out of here." He gave Burns' shoulder a pat. "You stay here. I've got an idea."

Grabbing his knife, Ryan dropped out of the plane and made a trek back into the woods.

...

Ryan Hall Smithers, former First Class Scout of the Cradle of Liberty Council sat on the beach beside the downed Blohm und Voss Ha 139, a German survival manual to his left side, and a set of parachute strips to his right. Off by the forest's edge were a jumble of thick bonewood branches he'd dragged back.

He worked tirelessly as the sun rose in the sky, twisting the silk strips into braided ropelike cords. Slowly but steadily, the pile by his feet grew. Ryan ignored the gnawing in his stomach, the early signs of hunger, forcing himself to ignore it. To fill his stomach, he'd take a break and drink from the water's edge, cupping the tannin-brown water in his palms, bringing it to his mouth. Despite the amber color it was cool and fresh. Perhaps some of the most pure-tasting water he'd ever had.

Ryan tried not to think of what microbes might be living in it. By logic, he should be using water purification tablets or boiling it, but gathering wood for a fire would take time he didn't have, and he wasn't sure which (if any) of the little tablets in the survival kit were for purification.

You'll have to take your chances with me like everything else, he thought to whatever microbes might be lurking in the water.

By mid-afternoon, Ryan had amassed a sizable stockpile of handmade rope as the sun started to dip west. He coiled them neatly around his arm, and set them in a loop to the side. Now, on to the branches.

In the survival manual, he'd seen a picture of a stretcher. It looked simple enough to build, and the diagram showed it being hauled by one man, while his injured comrade lay strapped to it.

The basic concept was an "V-frame" construction out of branches, the tip of the 'V' being dragged on the ground, while the able-bodied person held the legs behind him. Ryan wondered if, with a bit more modification and some additional roping, he could make a harness that would leave his hands free while he pulled Burns' on the drag-sledge. It wouldn't be too hard, he imagined, especially if he fastened it around the waist-band of his hiking pack.

It was sunset before Ryan finally finished the drag-sledge, stretcher, whatever it was. The three branches were lashed together with parachute cord: two long legs of the 'V' and a single crosspiece at the top to hold everything stable. Ryan wove a good amount of the rope he'd made into loops that would hold Burns steady. Once he got Burns on the sledge, then he'd wrap the old man in blankets and the remainder of the shredded parachute; a papoose.

Somehow the idea of Burns wrapped like a burrito made him chuckle. He shook his head, trying to bring his mind back on the here and now.

His travel plans were straight forward.

Without any true sense of where they were, and no idea where the nearest settlement might be, his best recourse was to follow the outlet. From somewhere in his minimal training, he remembered a scout master explaining little streams lead to bigger rivers, and those eventually bring one to civilization.

During his brief breaks in building, he'd taken the opportunity to patrol the lake shore as far as he easily could.

It was a gift of fate or perhaps indeed God's hand that set their plane near the outflow. The banks looked relatively clear, enough that with perseverance he'd be able to make it downstream with Burns in tow.

There was no point in starting that evening though. Why leave the perfectly good shelter of the Blohm und Voss to go staggering through the darkness. Tonight, he'd organize their supplies, figure out what he could affordably carry, and resign to abandoning the rest. There was no way he'd be able to tote that metal survival pack. Same with the bulky first aid kit.

In the darkened hold, sitting beside Burns, Ryan sorted until the nighttime swallowed the last traces of light. When he could no longer see his own hand in front of his face he gave up. He pulled a blanket over himself, and bedded down, pressing his back against Burns' side. It wasn't for his own comfort, but the old man would probably need all the warmth he could get. Ryan would be their own heater in the cold spring air.

Listening to the symphony of frogs from the shoreline, Ryan took a deep breath, and cleared his mind. There was nothing more he could do but surrender himself to the night once again. The dull, unsatisfied ache in his belly passed. In time, he found peace.


	4. Chapter 4

**_No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it's not the same river and he's not the same man._ **

Heraclitus

 **I secretly understood: the primative appeal of the hearth.**

John Updike

* * *

Waylon J. Smithers Jr paced the length and breadth of the stately executive office at the Springfield Nuclear Power Plant. The office might've been imposing, but it paled in comparison to Waylon's formidable mood.

It wasn't uncommon for Charles Montgomery Burns to disappear for a day or two at a time. The man was capricious, known for following his whims. Waylon had come to accept that as part and parcel of their arrangement. But Ryan? That was a different matter.

Yesterday, Waylon had been on the phone, leaving multiple calls to both Ryan and Burns respectively.

 _Monty, I know you're probably fine, but please call me when you get the chance. I'm worried about you, and I want to know you're okay_.

His messages to Ryan took on a rather different tone.

 _Ryan Hall Smithers, you need to call me at once young man! If I find out you've been gallivanting around with Monty and casually ignoring me, you are grounded when you get home. Do you hear me? Grounded!_

On sheer desperation, he'd even skyped his friends in New York. _Monty and my son haven't come to visit you, by any chance have they?_

The blue-haired man and his lean housemate shook their head. _Honestly, I didn't even know he was out east, the former replied. Tell you what though, if he shows up, I'll make sure he calls ya. We both will, right Prep?_

 _Absolutely_ , the second man agreed.

Disheartened, Waylon thanked them both, and disconnected.

He'd gone to bed that night angrily clenching his jaw, unable to relax. By morning, his last thread of patience was all but gone. He drove to work, handling his car hard, aggressively. He slammed into his parking spot and stormed up to the office, the tempest of his mood brewing on the horizon.

By mid-day he was ready to throw at least three employees to the wolves, and threaten a dozen more. Word spread quickly. Avoid Smithers at all costs. He'll release hounds if you're lucky, wolverines if you're not.

Waylon heard the rumors, and didn't care. As long as it kept people out of his way, that was fine by him.

What he couldn't express to anyone was the truth of the matter: he was worried sick about both his men. Ryan rarely went more than twelve hours without checking in either by text or social media. He'd always returned Waylon's calls within a day if not sooner, even during finals season. Waylon had a sinking feeling in his guts that something terrible had happened.

He pulled up the projected flight plan Burns had registered, and printed it out, overlaying it with the rolled maps Burns kept by the globe.

If what Burns had listed was correct, his path would be a slow-and-low course up over the great boreal forests of Canada. The plane he was taking was not rated for high altitude, and would have to avoid urban areas. Too much commercial just congestion, no fly-zones, minimum altitude restrictions. Waylon grabbed a protractor from the desk and started marking off circles where he knew they couldn't have gone.

Within half an hour, Waylon had narrowed it down to a rough area of where they could've conceivably flown. He stared at the marked map, then put his head in his hands. It was still a wide swatch of unknown, hundreds square miles across Manitoba and Saskatchewan. Waylon took a deep breath, fought back the urge to light a cigarette. He'd never hear the end of it if Monty came back to the office smelling of cheap tobacco smoke.

After a moment he raised his head and folded his hands under his chin.

The next step was simple, albeit one he hated to make. It could turn into an international incident if the press heard of it. He'd have to be sure to keep everything hushed, play it as if Burns and his son were merely on sabbatical if anyone outside of the need-to-know circle asked.

Waylon Smithers was loathed to call the Canadian Armed Forces. He knew though, without the aid of the Royal Canadian Air Force, there was no way he'd be able to find Monty and Ryan on his own.

If his estimations were correct, they'd be under the jurisdiction of the Trenton Search and Rescue Region.

He picked up the phone, dialed the international number, and waited while connections were made.

* * *

One thing Ryan Smithers had not planned on was how to get Burns out of the airplane. He stood on the pontoon, huffing with exertion under the morning sun, sweat cooling on his skin. Ryan had given up worrying about a neck on the old man. During one of his attempts to carefully move Burns, he'd struck the side of Burns' knee against the doorframe. Involuntarily, Burns' leg had twitched.

If he was paralyzed, that wouldn't happen, Ryan assumed.

At least it meant he didn't have to worry as much. Now, it was only a matter of not dropping the unconscious man into the water.

"Why… couldn't we have landed… further on the beach," Ryan grunted, trying to pull Burns over the raised frame as gently as possible. It was hardly an agreeable position. The hatch was several feet above the pontoon, a modest challenge for Ryan at the best of times. He had to stand on the pontoon and haul himself in or out. It wasn't awful, he was in good shape and reasonably athletic, but Burns changed everything. Throw in over one hundred pounds of saggy dead-weight, and the task became next to impossible.

After several failed attempts, and more than enough profanities, Ryan was finally able to pull Burns across his back in a rough fireman's carry. Balancing precariously on the pontoon he stepped carefully down into the sand.

"I swear, if you make me roll an ankle, we're both stuck, old man. I'm not sure I could get you back in that plane now even if I wanted to."

Burns, as expected, said nothing. Not even when Ryan dumped him unceremoniously on the stretcher in the sand. Ryan knelt down, tying the straps around Burns, under his arms, around his legs, making sling loops similar to a climber's harness to distribute the man's weight, and keep him from sliding down.

Getting Burns out of the plane had been last on Ryan's to-do list.

That morning, slightly after sunrise he sorted out their provisions, leaving all the non-essential gear and things too bulky to carry in the plane. It left him with the bare minimum that he could fit in his pack. He hoped it would be enough.

His final act was to open one of the ration tins, to see if there was anything remotely edible after more than fifty years.

The canned food, whatever it had once been, had congealed into something that looked and smelled like old house-paint. Ryan tossed it out the hatch of the plane in disgust. A second packet was crushed coffee-beans, surprisingly aromatic. The smell made his mouth water. He didn't have a coffee pot or percolator, so those unfortunately were tossed as well. The chocolate was mummified. The only thing that managed to survive was some hard tack bread. Though stale, the crackers didn't taste strange, and they softened in his mouth as he chewed.

It was hardly enough to satisfy him. He ate slowly, trying to trick his stomach into thinking there was a full meal. Afterwards, he drank from the lake, trying to fill the remaining spaces in his belly. He made one last circuit through the plane and beach, checking for anything he might've forgotten.

I should leave a note, he thought, looking at the empty cockpit. He pulled the old trip log out and set it on the seat, flipped it to a blank page, and pulled a pen out of his bag. Quickly he jotted the date, and their names.

Ryan Smithers – C. Montgomery Burns. Monty is injured and unconscious. Plan to follow the outlet to civilization and seek medical care. Wish us luck. RHS.

He wasn't sure what else to say. There wasn't much. He set the broken compass on the page, climbed out of the plane, and shut the hatch behind him. At least it would keep animals out. Sooner or later, he reasoned, someone would see the plane on a satellite if nothing else. Though when that might be, he had no idea.

There was no reason to wait further. He lashed the legs of the stretcher to his waist-band with the rope he'd made, and started off.

...

It must've been a dry spring, and for that Ryan was most grateful. He could see the waterlines on the rocks, indicating times when the little stream must've been a raging creek. The sledge behind him slowed him down, but not as much as he was expecting. He whacked his way through the underbrush, always keeping the outlet on his right, never straying too far from it.

Once again, the pangs of hunger gnawed at his stomach. It was strange, he thought as he smacked another branch out of the way; it was as if he were getting used to them. _Ghandi went without food for three weeks_ , he reminded himself, head down. I plan to be out of here long before then.

"Right, Burnsie?" he asked aloud. "We'll be in champagne wishes and caviar dreams long before three weeks is up!"

There was something about chatting to the unconscious man that made Ryan feel less alone. He wondered who he was truly talking to: Burns or himself. Regardless, it helped, and it kept his spirits up.

He hadn't gone more than a mile or two before he heard the sounds of rushing water to his left.

Ryan paused, closing his eyes as he had the first night, and listened.

There was a second stream, maybe even a small creek that was angling towards them from the hills to the north. It sounded larger than the mellow tan water he currently followed. To his right, the outlet burbled softly. This water to his left was in a hurry, chasing itself in a rush to get into the lower lands. Somewhere, less than a quarter mile ahead, they merged.

Seeing by sound, Ryan could hear the wider combined stream continue on south and east, tumbling against the rocks. It sounded as if it continued to pick up speed as it ran off towards the edge of his audible horizon.

Ryan opened his eyes, and the world snapped back to its original, narrow scope. His line of sight was limited by the shrubs and undergrowth. Thirty feet, maybe? Beyond that, it was too dense to see. Strange that, how different listening to the world was, and how small everything seemed to his hazel eyes.

"We should cross here," he noted, looking at the rocks that intercepted the stream like stepping stones.

Had he not been carrying Burns and full pack, Ryan could've easily bounded across in one, maybe two long strides. Loaded down by his supplies and Burns' stretcher, he'd have to look for a narrow spot. He hadn't seen any upstream. Truthfully, the further they followed the outflow, the narrower and deeper it became, the banks rising higher on each side.

They were heading downhill and an increasing slope. The lake they'd crashed on to must've been on some sort of plateau between the hills around them. Ryan untied the straps that held the stretcher, and set his bag down. It made no sense to burn extra energy dragging Burns and his pack back and forth while he scouted for a suitable crossing. He wasn't sure how far he'd have to go, or if he'd be forced to result to backtracking.

 _And really, what's going to happen to them anyhow?_ he reasoned, as he looked at the pale man, wrapped in blankets and strapping save for his head. With a sigh of resolution, Ryan pushed himself up, wiped his palms on his increasingly dusty jeans. The sun was still not even halfway across the sky. He had plenty of time.

Ryan hiked downstream.

The banks of the brook continued to narrow, forcing the water into a deeper channel. By the time he reached the point where the waters merged, he was standing on a jutting granite slab that was easily twenty feet above the rushing waters below. There'd be no crossing there, nor had he seen anything that looked better on his way to the merge.

Disheartened, and more than a little annoyed, he trekked back.

He passed Burns and his supplies, then continued upstream, retracing his steps, following the clear furrow the 'V' of the stretcher had made in the pebbly earth.

It wasn't long before he came to a wide spot, broad but shallow, the water moving slowly over a gravel bottom. Not quite a slough, but close enough. A spot where the water seemed to take a break and regroup before plunging onward into the channel. The banks on either side were sandy, rather than rock and mud.

Ryan picked up a pinecone off the side of the bank and hurled it into the water at the leading edge of the pool. He watched as it lazily drifted downstream, picking up speed towards the edge where the water funneled into the narrow gap.

He tossed a second pinecone, watching the currents.

They seemed gentle enough.

There was no way he was going to be able to avoid wet feet.

Ryan dipped his fingers into the water and winced. It was like bitter cold. Moreso even than the lake. That made sense, he reasoned. The water by the beach beside the plane had been sitting still in the sun. This ran briskly under the shade of the conifers. It didn't have time to sit and warm. It made his memories of the lake seem positively tepid by comparison.

With a mutter of annoyance he returned to the spot he'd left Burns and his gear.

"We've got to go back," he explained as he donned his pack and the stretcher. "It's unavoidable. I'm going to have to carry you too. So don't make this weird for me."

...

It took Ryan three trips in total to bring everything across the knee-deep ford. After weighing the pros and cons, he decided the bottom looked smooth enough, and his wet sneakers would chafe his feet. They were relatively new, the leather not well broken in yet.

He sat on the bank, untied his shoes, removed his socks, and wedged them into the top of his pack. Supplies and footwear made the first trip. He rolled up the cuffs of his jeans as far as they would go, and stepped in.

For the second trip, he untied Burns from the stretcher, and carried that over, held high above his head to keep it dry.

The third and final trip was Burns himself, and Ryan soon discovered, light or not, it wasn't easy to gather Burns from the ground onto his shoulders. After several staggering attempts, he finally managed to drape Burns across his back, fireman's carry once again, and made his final trip through the stream.

By the time he was done, his feet were bright red with cold. He rubbed them vigorously to warm them, and bring some feeling back into the numb flesh. He dried them on a corner of a wool blanket, taking great care to wipe all the sand off lest it cause blisters at his heels and toes, then pulled his sneakers on.

He tied Burns back into the loops on the stretcher, and secured blankets around the old man to keep him warm. That done he shouldered his pack, and hauled the ends of the stretcher back into his strap harness. Ryan gave one last look at the sky. "No way," he said, looking at the sun. It was already slipping behind him. The entire crossing must've taken well over an hour. Maybe closer to two.

It hadn't seemed that long.

"We've got to get moving," he announced. Knife in hand, he resumed his journey downstream, opposite the westward sun.

He took the high road, keeping above the water. The banks of the river were steep granite cliffs. There was no sense in treading too close. The river continued to cut deeper, forcing Ryan further from the edge of the gorge.

From his vantage point he could see the pinkish-grey rock, solid and angular; not smooth like sandstone, or layered like sedimentary slab. Lichens of green and white clung to the cliff walls in defiance of gravity. Here and there, a small tree would jut out from the side, its roots anchoring it precariously to the vertical face, trunk ancient, narrow and stunted.

Plumes of mist rose from the waterfalls that cascaded down, tumbling through rocks like water through a dragon's maw, then slamming into deep pools below.

The sun was appreciably behind him now.

Ryan guessed it must've been close to late afternoon.

Still he continued downstream, following the river. There was no shelter on the high granitic walls, the ground was slanting and treacherous. It would do him no good to make camp for the evening. The woods beyond weren't much better; a tilted forest of evergreens and dislodged rocks. The spray from the river left everything damp, smelling of cedar and wet moss.

No chance of a fire.

No reason to stop and try.

Doggedly, ignoring hunger and fatigue, Ryan pressed on.

...

The sun was drawing close to the horizon by the time Ryan finally made his way out of the foothills, and the ground levelled out.

Ryan's feet, were heavy, his back aching from the combined weight of his pack and Burns' sledge. He paused, leaning his chest against a young tree to catch his breath.

The river had widened and slowed, maturing into broad expanse that rippled lazily under the reddening sky. "We can camp here… somewhere," Ryan told Burns, panning his head for a dry spot. Everything around him seemed level, but soggy. The sand and granite giving way to earth and mud. Ryan's shoes made soft squishing sounds with each step.

The survival book had shown pictures of how to build elevated sleeping platforms, but Ryan had no idea how long one of those would take. He also doubted his skill to even make such a structure that could hold both him and Burns off the wet ground.

Despite that, he was reluctant to stray too far from the river. In the slanting sunset rays, his eyes fell upon something unusual near the river's edge several hundred yards ahead.

It was a bright flash of light, shining into his eyes.

Ryan raised a hand and waved it above his head.

"Hello! Over here!"

He gave a bit of a jump, both arms up.

The light appeared to follow the movement of his head.

Ryan paused, curious.

The light held still. It didn't move until he shifted his stance.

Raising a hand to shield his eyes, Ryan peered into the light. His stomach dropped with realization. It wasn't a search beam. It was the same colour as the setting sun. "Just a reflection," he sighed to Burns.

Reflection? his mind barked. On what? Then the metaphorical light dawned on him. Nothing in nature could produce that perfect a square of mirrored light. It was clearly man-made, whatever it was. Squinting, Ryan could just make out the square form of a log wall, blending into the treeline. At the edge, a rock chimney protruded out.

A cabin! He hadn't seen it before because old wood was covered with lichens, blending in thoroughly with the plant life surrounding it. If he hadn't caught the reflection of the setting sun, he could've passed right by it.

Maybe someone is looking out for me, he thought. Forgetting his sore muscles, the dull throb in his feet, he broke into as much of a run as he could manage, loaded down as he was, indifferent to the bouncing of the sledge behind him.

He galloped up to the cabin, sledge knocking carelessly against an oblong shape under a half-rotten brown tarp. There was a metallic _thunk_ as the two collided.

"Have a care, Smithers," a dry voice rasped from behind him. "I'm not made of wood, you know."

Ryan twisted his neck around, unable to suppress the grin that split his face. "Monty! You're awake!"

Burns' opened one eye, looking up at him, slightly dazed. "Oh, you, Smithers. Or at least one of them. Very well, Ryan. Carry on." He closed his eyes, head dropping back to his chest. In a minute, he was snoring softly.

Elated, Ryan quickly untied the stretcher, setting it down as gently as possible, cabin almost forgotten in his excitement. "You're alive!" he crowed, gently patting Burns' cheek. "Come on, Monty! Say something else!"

"How about 'Stop this damn fool discomposure, and let an old man rest a moment.'"

Ryan clapped his hands together in excitement. "Strangely, that's enough! Hang on, I'm going to find us a way in."

The cabin was small, a one room structure with a chimney at one end, and a padlocked door at the other. The bolt holding the lock was rusted and aged almost behind recognition. Ryan remembered the scenes from police movies. He leaned back, and kicked the door solidly with all his strength. The metal broke away, and the door swung inward.

The room was dark, not that he'd expected otherwise, and devoid of furniture, but at least it was dry. A fireplace, more an indoor pit than an actual fire _place_ was set along the back wall. A pile of wood, ancient and dry sat in the corner.

"Well, I suppose we can call this home for tonight," Ryan said proudly. "Must be some old trapper's cabin, or something. Looks like it was built a hundred years ago," he added, noting the whole log construction, the thick glass panes. "At least it'll keep us warm, right Monty?"

He bounded outside and grabbed the ends of the stretcher. "In we go!"

Burns said nothing, but he opened his eyes and gave Ryan a rather annoyed look.

"Don't worry," Ryan said as he made a bed roll and shifted Burns on to it. "I'll let you sleep. But first, you need to drink a little water for me." He pulled out his metal canteen, and rested it against the old man's lips.

Burns rolled his eyes, but drank.

Ryan let him have a few mouthfuls, then pulled it back. "Too much might make you sick. You've been out for a while."

Burns rocked his head left then right, taking stock of their situation. "Where the devil are we, boy?"

"Damned if I know," Ryan replied, sitting back on his haunches. "Canada, I guess?"

"You 'guess'?" Burns asked, shaking his head. "Young Smithers, you truly must perfect your orienteering skills. To not even know what country you've gotten us into now? I find that unacceptable…" Burns' voice trailed off again.

This time, Ryan didn't bother to rouse him. He went outside, and in the last light of the evening sun gathered as much kindling as his eyes could find: dry grass, small twigs, larger dry branches easily broken. He bundled them up, and laid them on the hearth, a small pyramid with small leading to large.

At least I have matches, he thought as he fumbled with his pack in the dark; a small pack from a bar near college. It would be easier than the flint and steel from Burns' plane.

He tore one of the flimsy cardboard pieces off and struck it against the strip on the cover.

With a sulfurous poof, a small flame jumped to life. He quickly touched it to the kindling in the hearth before it could go out. The dry grass caught immediately. Ryan blew on the flame gently, encouraging it to eat the twigs, and begin gnawing on the branches.

When the flames were strong, he added a log from the pile, and leaned back, feeling quite satisfied with himself.

If this hadn't been a life or death matter, it could almost feel cozy.

He looked over at the thin man sleeping in a nest of blankets, then back to the fire.

Ryan had never truly studied flames before. As he sat there, by the river, listening to the forest noises beyond, he felt a sort of kinship with the dancing orange beast on the hearth. It was as if the flames were whispering a story.

 _Fire was not our first invention. It was our first pet. The first wild thing mankind brought into their homes. We caught it, tamed it, learned how to feed and care for it. In time, we even learned how to make it reproduce. But we always have to be careful. Fire is not a tame pet, not a tame lion. It is, at its heart a wild animal. If this is forgotten, or we become careless, fire will quickly remind us of its feral soul._

Ryan stretched out on his side, watching the embers ripple and glow.

 _You're a good fire_ , he thought to the small flame rolling in its nest. _We'll keep you small, and you'll keep us warm. With you, this place feels like home. Goodnight, fire. Goodnight, Monty._

The flames continued their graceful dance from behind his closed eyelids. Exhausted, but oddly content, Ryan let their crackling lullaby sing him to sleep.


	5. Chapter 5

**_For man, as for flower and beast and bird, the supreme triumph is to be most vividly, most perfectly alive._**

 _D. H. Lawrence  
_

 ** _Survival can be summed up in three words - never give up. That's the heart of it really. Just keep trying._**

 _Bear Grylls_

* * *

Ryan Smithers stretched and rolled over, the hardwood planks felt strange under his back. Different from the deck of the plane he'd spent the last nights on. He propped himself up and glanced towards the fire. It had burned down over the night, leaving nothing but ash. Ryan reached his hand out, over the grey powder.

The remains were still warm. If he poked around with a branch, he'd probably find a live ember or two. It wasn't necessary though, he decided. The cabin felt warm enough.

Ryan turned his attention to Mister Burns.

The old man lay curled on his side in a fetal position, the blankets wrapped tightly around him, breathing softly. He seemed asleep, but as Ryan stood up he shifted slightly.

"I know you're awake," Ryan said. He knelt by their supplies and began packing.

"Is it that self-evident?" Burns asked tiredly.

Ryan folded his blankets and tucked tied them in a roll. "It is when I've been listening to your breath for the past three days, while you've been unconscious."

"Apothegmatic as always, Ryan," Burns muttered. He tried to push himself up with is good arm, and failed, landing on his left side. He drew in his breath sharply, wincing. "Blast this inadequate appendage," he hissed. Burns flopped onto his back and regarded Ryan dolefully.

He so looked pitiful lying there. Ryan tried to offer a reassuring smile. He slid one hand under Burns' good arm, and helped the old man to a sitting position. Burns pushed the blankets off his lap. He said nothing, but he didn't need to. Ryan could read the thoughts that passed across his face.

"You're welcome."

Burns humphed, but there was a faint twitch at the edge of his mouth.

"I'm going outside," Ryan announced. "I want to get a feel for the lay of the land. I thought I saw what might be a boat under a tarp. With luck, it'll still be usable. Don't go anywhere."

Burns raised his eyebrows. "Do you truly think I'd be in such a condition to venture abroad of my own volition?"

Ryan shrugged. "Right now, I'm not sure what you think you might be able to do. So, yes; no. Either way, here are some biscuits, and I'll get some water too. Those jars there look clean enough," he noted, glancing up to the shelves.

Burns said nothing. Merely sat, hunched up around his injured arm, watching Ryan with stoic blue eyes.

...

The shape under the rotted tarp was indeed a boat; an old, aluminum row boat. Ryan pulled the crumbling plastic pack from the hull and inspected the craft. Once, it looked like it had been painted a dark brown, possibly camouflage tones. Now, most of the paint had chipped and peeled, revealing the oxidized grey aluminum body. The boat was small, much smaller than he'd thought. Maybe ten feet long; maybe.

Ryan inspected the scuffed and dented hull.

The boat had clearly seen some hard use in its time. The edges of the keel were scraped, probably from hitting rocks of being dragged over them. Age, and being left outside for an indeterminate number of years had done the small boat no favors either.

Ryan bent down and slid his fingers under the gunwale, aware of the ragged metal edge. He braced his feet, lifting with his legs, and flipped the boat upright.

The boat looked no better from this side, he concluded. There were two pitted and worn aluminum seats that were once designed as floatation devices, that might not be watertight now. A pair of wooden oars were wedged beneath them. He hauled the oars out, and inspected them.

Like everything else, they were definitely the worse for wear. They'd work though. The oarlocks seemed solid enough. A moldy and frayed roped was tied in the bow. It was splintery, brittle, and quickly disintegrated in Ryan's hands.

He wiped his palms on his increasingly rough jeans, and surveyed the scene.

It wouldn't be hard for him to drag the boat the river. No harder than anything else he'd tackled so far. If it proved seaworthy, that would be unquestionably better than hiking with Burns through the squelching ground of this floodplain.

Would Burns even want to walk, Ryan wondered. _And even if he did, would he be capable of it?_ Ryan tried to imagine lashing an unwilling Monty Burns to the stretcher and dragging him, hissing and spitting like an angry cat through the wilderness. The cartoon-like image his mind provided made him laugh.

"I could do it," Ryan chuckled, "but it wouldn't be pretty."

Hopefully, whatever they decided, Burns would agree and come quietly.

Ryan wrapped his fingers around the handle on the bow of the boat, and braced his heels in the mud. Scrabbling for purchase against the slick ground, he surged back, dragging the boat as he went. It was slow going, and sweat soon dotted his brow, but he found himself enjoying the work. At least it was productive. It felt like he was getting somewhere. With every inch that he hauled the boat, he was that much closer to civilization.

As he worked, Ryan found his mind flitting back to his Burns. The man wasn't his father, but they did have a relationship after a sort. He was grateful that Monty was awake. More than he'd expected infact. He found he'd missed the old man's dry comments, the slight snarky tone Burns used when speaking with him. Ryan knew – they both knew – it was Burns' way of saying he cared.

Theirs was a companionship, slow to warm up, but strong once it did. At times, he and Monty seemed to have more in common than he did with his own father, Waylon. Perhaps it was more of an understanding, that they were both their own men, setting upon personal journeys. At times flying in the face of convention to be true to themselves.

It was, he reflected, more similarities than he had with his father.

Or, if not common ground directly, at least differences that blended well.

Ryan had left home after his mother's death, with no exact destination in mind. All he knew was that the world he thought he knew was gone, and it was time to go.

Burns had studied abroad in Europe, only to return to find the last family he knew dead. Monty Burns had buried his grandfather's remains by his own hand.

Ryan had held his mother's hand as she died.

There was a certain finality in both their lives, an unspoken understanding that comes with knowing if even one were to go back to a place, one could never return to the time that once was.

Ryan knew, as he lugged the boat towards the water, that he would never return to Philadelphia. At least not his version of it. The apartment he and his mother had shared was undoubtedly rented out by now. Even if he walked up those familiar steps to the landing and knocked on the door, it wouldn't be his mother answering. It would be some strange couple, friendly but confused by his presence.

In his mind's eye he imagined walking in, crossing the familiar threshold once again.

His heart wanted to believe it would be returning home.

Ryan's mind knew better.

Everything would be changed. The drapes, the potholder with a rooster on it, that annoying yet oddly endearing plastic cookie jar which played "Green Acres" whenever the lid was lifted? That was gone. Ryan knew that for a fact. He'd been the one to sell them.

Burns understood loss too.

The old man knew what it was like to lose the things that made a house into a home. Sometimes, after Waylon had gone to bed, Ryan would wander the halls of Burns Manor with the ancient patriarch, listening to the man's stories from a past he'd never again share.

It wasn't that Monty was unhappy. It wasn't that simple.

The problem was, as Monty had put it one night by the fire: _you can return to a place, and know it will never be the same. For time and memories cast a veneer, and in the end, all we have to hold on to is the present, and what we think we once knew_.

 _I understand_ , Ryan replied, looking into Burns' face. He didn't know how to explain it, but on some intrinsic level the old man's words made perfect sense.

 _Your father doesn't fully understand-_ Burns began, but Ryan cut him off.

 _-He's young, and though he's gone through? It's different. He's never been in that situation where he questioned whether he should even bother to live or die._

 _What would you know about that?_ Burns asked.

Ryan gave him a smile, the hollow sort that didn't reach his eyes _. After my mother died, I only had plans to Santa Monica pier. Beyond that? Well, I was okay with saying goodbye. To everything._

Burns reached out a hand, brushing a black strand of hair away from Ryan's glasses. A gesture oddly kind. _I, for one, am glad you didn't. And your father is unquestionably glad as well. Your life has value, young Ryan, even when you may forget it. Let me remind you, as your father has reminded me, there is so much more to life than the end._

"And that," Ryan grunted as he dragged the heavy rowboat into the swampy edge of the river, "Is why I'm not giving up now." His feet were in the water now, and he didn't care.

"Do you hear that?" he asked, raising his head defiantly to the blue sky. "I'm not going to die out here. I don't care what shit you decide to throw at me. I'm not giving up!"

He thumped his fists against his chest, listening to his voice echo across the wide river.

 _I'm not giving up!_

"Damn right, I'm not. So you can just suck it, because we're going home!"

 _We're going home!_

...

Ryan stood in the slow water just beyond the shoreline, watching the boat bob amongst the reeds. It wasn't filling up with water, a pleasant surprise. Ryan pushed the gunwale down, testing its resilience.

The small metal boat bobbed with stalwart integrity.

Ryan grinned ear to ear.  
He pulled off his wet shoes, his mud-caked socks, rinsed them in the river then tossed them beside the seat. If he'd been thinking, he would've taken them off sooner, but there was no going back now. The sun would dry them, he reasoned, and he still had at least one pair of dry socks in his pack. He could manage being barefoot for now.

Still beaming to himself, he pulled the boat back up on shore just far enough it wouldn't drift away. He filled the old mason jars from the clean water a little way upstream. The water where he'd been standing was too muddy to drink.

With a spring in his step, he bounded back to the cabin, trying not to spill the water as he went.

Burns was sitting where Ryan had left him, an empty wrapper by his feet. "Those biscuits leave a great deal to be desired, Ryan," Burns remarked as Ryan trotted in and offered him the jar of water.

"Hey, they're from your plane, not mine; not that I have a plane anyhow," Ryan replied sitting down on the floor nearby. Water pooled around his ankles from the still dripping cuffs of his jeans. "There's a boat, and the river's wide. We can travel by water for a while. It'll be easier than walking, or…" his voice trailed off.

Ryan and Burns both eyed the makeshift stretcher silently.

"I can…" Ryan began to offer.

"No," Burns replied curtly. "I am more than fit to walk from hereon. Whatever abuse I may have suffered at that impact, I assure you I'm greatly improved now. I daresay I could rival you for stamina, young Ryan."

"Yeah?" Ryan asked as he tore into a packet of ancient crackers. "I doubt that Monty. Yesterday, you barely seemed to know who I was."

"A jest, I assure you."

Ryan shoved a cracker in his mouth and swallowed mightily. "I might believe that if your arm weren't still in a sling, and your face weren't half-covered in that bruise."

Burns grumbled some remark, and Ryan laughed. For a moment, they were just two men trading affectionate verbal jabs over breakfast. It felt strange, almost normal. If they hadn't been lost in the Canadian wilderness, they might as well have been back at Burns Manor.

"I swear, Ryan. I shall never fully grasp your implacable desire to have the final word in any such discussion."

Ryan gave an innocent shrug. "You've said it yourself, the impertinence of youth."

"Bah." Burns waved a hand. "Your confidence both bolsters and vexes my sensitivities in one. You are infuriating, obdurate, and engaging in one." He took a sip of the water, made a slight face, then shrugged. "Academic prowess is one thing, but textbook success is hardly a fair measure of a man. I find adversity proves the best way to test the mettle of one's character, don't you agree?"

The young man shrugged again. "If you're saying that hardship is what truly allows one's character to shine, I'd agree with you. Some people fold under pressure, some people rise to the occasion."

Burns raised his jar, as if in honor. "Exactly! It is also the chance to gauge the altruism of another. Is aid metered out in kind, or does one focus upon his own survival at all costs?"

Ryan wrung out the cuffs of his jeans, watching the muddy water leach into the cracks on the floor. "Are you saying you're surprised I didn't leave you behind?"

The old man regarded Ryan carefully. "Should I be? Are you one to consider your nature self-centric? _Would_ you have left me for dead if it were to your ultimate benefit?"

Rocking back on his haunches, Ryan couldn't help but laugh. "Oh, like I enjoyed hauling your unconscious ass for miles before schlepping you across that river and dragging you some more! Come off it, Burnsie! You know I wouldn't have done that."

Burns finished the water is his jar in a slow sip, his eyes never leaving Ryan's as he drank.

"I know that now," he replied, wiping his mouth daintily. "So, you made mention of river travel? We may as well be getting on. The day's not getting younger, nor are we." He handed his jar to Ryan who wrapped them both in a blanket.

"Touché," Ryan replied. "Let's go then."

...

Rowing with the current is always easier than fighting against it. Even in the slow, heavy current of the broad water, they made good time. The sun rose higher, surprisingly hot in the still air. Ryan took off his shirt and tied it around his head, letting the sun shine on his bare shoulders.

It didn't cool him much. Soon, his body was glistening with sweat. He felt the hot spots of blisters begin to form on his palms as the rough wood of the oars pushed against his skin. From time to time, he paused, letting the current carry them. When he got thirsty, he dipped his mason jar in the cool, amber water, and drank heavily.

He'd given up on worrying about waterborne diseases. At this point, he'd either get sick or he wouldn't. But he'd been fine thus far. There was no reason to assume anything would change.

For the most part, Burns was quiet. The old man was trying to maintain composure, but Ryan could tell from his pinched face and slumped shoulders that he was far from well. Burns' early morning liveliness had been replaced by a sullen determination: to keep Ryan from seeing how injured the old man truly was.

Burns cradled his broken arm to his chest, body folded almost double to his own lap.

Ryan pretended not to notice. It was a small courtesy, but the only one he could offer his step-father at the moment.

The river bent and curved, Ryan's thoughts drifting with it. At some points, the water picked up speed, and he had to dip the oars in to steer them towards the more gentle currents. Ryan found himself losing track of time and distance. The miles slipped away, passing with the shaded tree-line, forgotten in an almost meditative calm. He didn't have to keep glancing forward over his shoulder. It was as if his body could feel the eddies, and adjust naturally.

Up ahead, the river narrowed a bit as it cut around a tight oxbow bend. The outer side was steep, where the river had bit into the hillside with each high surge. The inner side was shallow and lazy, sediment accumulating from the more leisurely flow. The heavy rocks were always the first to be deposited, then gravel, pebbles, and finally sand. Each particle, lighter than the last, carried further in the water's grasp.

Ryan rowed towards the middle of the current, balancing the speed of the river against its depth, not wishing to run aground on the sandbar to his side.

Like many of the bows, this one was tight, changing their course nearly a fully one hundred and eighty degrees. The sun seemed to swing around them, and Ryan had to remind himself of its fixed position. The sun was where it always was. It was just them that had turned.

After a second switchback the river's course slowed again, presenting a long straight way.

Burns gave a cough, and pointed ahead.

Ryan pulled the oars into the boat and turned around.

A railroad bridge spanned the river, black iron and steel supported by massive granite block pylons. On the leeward side, where the bank was mostly level, an earth and riprap berm had been constructed, supporting the tracks as they approached the bridge.

Ryan flexed his blistered palms. "We should get out and follow them," he noted. "They'll take us back to civilization!"

He'd just begun to reach for the oars when Burns' leaned forward, and put a pale hand on his chest. "No," Burns replied, shaking his head. "We're best staying the course."

Ryan pivoted, watching the bridge as they drifted closer. "But, but…" he started to protest.

Burns' hand was still on his skin, cool fingers pressing him back. "What is your intent? Run ashore by that rise and climb up? Suppose, young Ryan, that such a rail line is still even in operation? That the rails haven't grown pitted with rust and disuse; then what?"

Ryan shifted his weight. "We'd follow it!"

"To what way, Ryan? Suppose you head east, the way we're traveling now. And you pick you way hot and dry away from the water we both need. Why, you could follow that line a hundred miles deeper into the wilderness, and all the while if we'd only but turned west we would've found a town in but three miles."

Burns shook his head and continued. "No, Ryan. No. It's not worth the risk. Even under idea circumstances the odds of either route leading to nearby development is slim. It is just as likely, if not moreso, that both ways will do little more but span for dozens if not hundreds of miles, taking us deeper astray."

Ryan tilted his head, watching as the silent grey pylons slid past, the shadow of the iron bridge casting a latticed shadow across their craft.

"It is better, young man, to let some uncertainties go."

There wasn't much more Ryan could say to that. He dangled his raw hands in the water, feeling it soothe his aching hands, then resumed rowing at a steady pace.

...

Traveling by boat had been an unexpected blessing, and Ryan didn't even bother to guess the distance they'd traveled, but all too soon it came to an impossible end. The current picked up, the river becoming narrow and rocky. Unwilling to test either the craft or his skill at navigating rapids, he was forced to pull ashore, load their gear onto his back, and help Burns to his feet.

 _At least my shoes dried out_ , Ryan thought as his feet crunched onto the rocky shoreline.

Burns didn't complain as he stepped out, leaning on Ryan for support. The ground wasn't necessarily treacherous, but the rocks were round and slick, haphazardly placed by the water. Ryan dragged the boat as far inland as he could, pulling it up under the tree-line before abandoning the effort.

"We're probably not going to use it again anyhow," he muttered, with one last frustrated tug. "I don't know why I bothered."

He bent down and pulled a smooth, barkless branch from between two rocks. It was about six feet long and straight, polished by the elements. He offered it to Burns as a walking stick.

The old man accepted wordlessly, with a flicker of gratitude in his eyes.

Already the sun was dropping lower. The days seemed too short, Ryan thought, and yet at the same time far too long. He untied his shirt from his neck, and slipped it back over his sunburned skin, wincing at the sensation. Who would've thought the spring sun could be so strong? An important lesson there, he decided. Unfortunately, there was nothing more he could do about it.

Like the peeling skin on his palms and fingertips, it was a discomfort he'd have to endure.

In the back of his mind, Ryan figured he should be hungry. For some reason, his appetite seemed nonexistent. Perhaps it was the water in his belly, or determination. Or maybe, eating three meals a day was just propaganda.

Ryan's mind wandered as he walked, listening to the river and forest sounds merging with his own thoughts. Behind him, Burns' footfall was slow, but steady. Ryan unconsciously adjusted his pace, slowing to a speed Burns could manage without even thinking about it. They were in this together. He would not leave the old man behind.

Over the past few days, Ryan had become surprisingly comfortable with the sounds of the wilderness around him. What at first had seemed a deafening silence when compared to the dull roar of society was actually a world as vibrant and loud as any human noise. It was simply more subtle. It was not like the dull grinding roar of an engine

Nothing like the churning an incoming plane's propeller mincing the air.

He shook his head, nothing like it at all.

Propeller?! Engine!? Ryan snapped to attention, staring up through the evergreen boughs above his head. "A plane!" he yelled, shrugging off his pack and bucking towards the river's edge. "It's a plane!"

No sooner had he managed to call out to Burns than a yellow aircraft burst into view, loud and low over the treeline, following the river like a hawk. Ryan threw down his pack and sprinted through the undergrowth, recklessly fumbling in haste.

A root snagged his shoe, and he went tumbling forward, catching himself and launching forward without even feeling the impact. "Here! Here!" he yelled against the heavy beat of the thundering engines over his head.

"Use the signal mirror!" he heard Burns shouting as he crashed onto the rocky waterline, waving his arms at the disappearing tailfin.

The silence that followed the plane was as profound and oppressive as any he'd experienced before in his life. He waited, hoping the pilot had seen him, praying against all odds they'd circle back.

Nothing.

Seconds stretched into minutes, and then into more than Ryan even knew.

Ryan stood, arms outstretched. He felt like some cruel parody of a scarecrow. Disheartened, he left them fall. Slowly, he trudged back to Burns.

"The signal mirror," Burns asked softly, nodding a head towards Ryan's pack.

Ryan shook his head. "I don't have a mirror."

Burns gave a weak shrug. "It would've looked like a normal small mirror, but with a hole at the center for sighting on planes."

Ryan threw himself down on a fallen log. "Oh. That's what that was."

"Where is it?"

Ryan took off his glasses and ran a hand over his face. "I thought it was just a shaving mirror. I left it behind in the plane, with the rest of the nonessentials. I'm such an idiot!" He dropped his head in his hands.

Burns hovered nearby, as if uncertain what to say or do. After a moment, he reached out and put a hand on Ryan's shoulder. "It was an honest mistake. You didn't know."

"I should've," Ryan snapped, not looking up.

"No," Burns replied. "No…" his voice trailed off, as if he wanted to say more, but couldn't find the words. He licked his lips, and looked up towards the late afternoon sun. "That was a short-range aircraft, Canadian search and rescue. It couldn't have launched from far."

He reached out, grabbing Ryan's chin in his good hand. Ryan was intimately aware of the dark stubble covering his own chin, in parallel to Burns' white scruff. He allowed Burns to pull his head up. "If we press on, we may very well find our way into town before dark. There'll be a bright moon tonight. Light enough by which to see."

Ryan gave a curt sound of agreement. "But we need to stay closer to the river, out from under the trees, in case they come back."

"Naturally," Burns agreed, dropping into step behind the young man's lead.

...

Their process was laborious, and hot. In contrast to the shade under the conifers, the rocky edge of the river was notably warmer, especially as the air began to cool with lengthening day. The rocks which had been baking under the sun all day now returned the favor, radiating their heat upward, into Ryan's hands as he carefully clambered between them.

It was slow going.

The process would've been tedious at the best of times, but fatigue and pain was beginning to lodge itself in Ryan's joints, and Burns was in no condition to make haste.

Still, Ryan pushed himself forward, navigating the most stable path through the toasty rocks, between water and forest's edge. His shadow reached out from his feet, ever lengthening as the day drew to a close. At times, he had to push himself between larger boulders where the bank was steep. There, he carefully inched along, mindful of the smooth rocks under his shoes, always glancing back to see if Burns needed his help.

During one of those moments, in a sort of mock canyon between to massive granite slabs, Ryan drew up and looked back.

"Are you doing okay, Monty?" he asked.

The old man was moving with the overly conscientious movements of the weary. He was calculating each step, lifting one foot then placing it down, leaning on the branch Ryan had given him for stability. "This spot," Burns panted, stretching an arm out to indicate a narrow rise and short climb. Burns reached a hand out.

Ryan sat down, and slid himself forward. He hadn't thought about the step-like notch, but with two good hands, it had been easy to brace himself on the rocks and swing his feet through. Burns might've made it at the best of times.

These were not such times. Ryan braced his rump on the edge of the short ledge and looked for a spot to grip. The rock beside him had a knot of roots, a few tiny crevasses, plenty of space just wide enough for him to slip a hand into. He'd hold on with one hand guide Burns up with the other. Wedging his hips into the gap, he leaned forward.

"Come on, old man," he urged, reaching his free hand out.

Burns' fingers tightened around his, and Ryan found himself surprised by the strength Burns still managed to hold. Ryan leaned back, pulling Burns towards him, helping the thin man climb up and past him through the gap.

"Easy enough," Ryan panted. He pivoted and stood up, reaching towards a gap in the boulder to steady himself.

Ryan had barely lowered his hand into the space when he felt a sudden burning stab. "Gah!" He swore, and stumbled. Reflexively drew his hand up, clutching it to his chest. The motion threw him off balance and he tumbled forward, just barely avoiding a collision with the slow moving Burns.

"Are you okay, Ryan," the old man asked, immediately concerned.

"Fucking wasps!" Ryan hissed, carefully extending his hand into the fading light and examining the injury.

Two small holes dotted the edge of his right hand, just below his wrist bone.

"Not wasps…"

As if in affirmation came a rattling buzz from the rock. Neither man needed to say it. Rattlesnake. Ryan stared dumbly at his hand as two small drops of blood filled the holes, and ran out. Ryan swore again, first quietly, then loudly until he was screaming into the darkening sky.

He raised his hand, shook it, wincing as the droplets of blood spattered free. Instinctively he drew his hand to his mouth.

"No!" Burns snapped, snatching Ryan's wounded hand. "Don't."

Ryan paused, bewildered.

"Let it bleed, keep it low and still, let the venom drain. Assuming there is even any."

Ryan curled his hand protectively in the hem of his shirt. "It's a rattlesnake."

"And not all bites are envenomed. But that is as assumption we cannot bank on. Slow your heart, Ryan. Breathe deeply. Grant that tainted blood the angle to flow freely. We will not stop tonight. We have no option but to press on."

Ryan resisted to urge to suck at his hand, and forced himself to hold it down. "It's getting dark."

Burns nodded.

"And the moon will rise soon. We walk, Ryan. My eyes and yours. You have made it this far, have you not? I've no doubt your unwavering desire to survive will carry you forward."

"Dead or alive, eh, Monty?" Ryan asked. It was a rhetorical question, and Burns apparently felt no need to reply. Ryan clenched his jaw in determination, biting his teeth against the throbbing pain in his hand, and pressed on.

Side by side, infinitesimally small against the vast wilderness, two lives refused to give in.

.

* * *

When he first began to see lights flickering between the trees, Ryan Hall Smithers wondered if they were real, or a hallucination. Neither he or Burns had spoken, both men fighting their own inner battle against themselves. From time to time thought, Ryan still dropped back, affording Burns what support he could with his good hand, ignoring the irony of their mutual condition.

Ryan's head swam, he felt dizzy and weak. He wasn't sure as he walked if it were a product of fatigue, or the subtle tendrils of the snake's neurotoxin shutting down his brain one cell at a time. He supposed it didn't matter. The plane hadn't come back, not that it would've seen them in the dark anyhow.

The fairy lights seemed to dance and swirl, tiny pinpricks that his eyes couldn't focus on.

He was willing to disbelieve them, until he heard Burns' dry voice beside his ear.

"Tell me, Ryan. Do you see those as well?"

"I thought it was just me," Ryan replied. Fighting his own body every step of the way, finding himself both unwilling to keep going, and unable to stop, Ryan staggered into a clearing lit with dozens of tiny lights.

Christmas lights! he thought in distracted amusement. They left them up all year round!

Strands of tiny lights wove around the handrail of a wooden deck on the back of a single story ranch house. Ryan grabbed Burns' arm, half-dragging him across the lawn to the sliding glass doors. He reached up, pounding on the trim with the flat of his good hand.

"Hello! Anybody home! We're hurt! We need help!"

The last thing Ryan remembered was the interior lights flicking on behind the back curtains, the sound of footsteps inside. The curtain was pulled back, slider door thrown open and a woman's face swam into view.

"We need help," Ryan panted, sinking down to his knees beside Burns' feet.

He heard the woman yell for her husband, a flurry of activity, then he remembered nothing more.


	6. Chapter 6

**_A journey is a person in itself; no two are alike._**

 _John Steinbeck_

 _ **I have frequently gained my first real insight into the character of parents by studying their children.**_

 _Sir Arthur Conan Doyle_

 _ **A man's character is his destiny.**_

 _Heraclitus_

* * *

The moment the private jet's wheels touched down in Iskoniskan, Canada, Waylon Smithers was already on his feet, on his phone, barking orders as he waited for the ground crew to secure the craft.

"I don't care what you the rules are. I need to see them immediately, and that's final." Waylon disconnected and glared at his phone. He appreciated the ease of a touch screen, but missed the finality that snapping an old flip-phone shut provided. It seemed so anticlimactic to simply hit "end." That hardly mattered though. What was most important at present was his family.

Waylon had gotten a call late last night from the Canadian Search and Rescue division. His son and husband both had been found alive, but not exactly well, in the small town of Muskeg, Saskatchewan; Burns suffering from a head wound and broken arm, Ryan the victim of a rattlesnake bite. With no anti-venom or large hospital, the two men had been airlifted by evac chopper to Iskoniskan's hospital, while the anti-venom was flown to meet them from the stocks.

It was quicker to meet halfway than it would've been to bring patient or treatment the full distance one way.

As soon as Waylon had gotten the call, he'd ordered the flight crew to make the plane ready. He packed while they prepped, and by the time he was done he was on schedule to depart from Springfield International Airport, adrenaline surging through his veins.

In the air, he'd begun to feel tired. What time was it? Sometime in the wee hours of the morning. He reclined on the couch and put an arm over his eyes. The flight would take at least two hours. He might as well rest while he could, Waylon reasoned.

By the time he landed though, he was wide awake again, fueled by a combination of fury and relief known only to loved ones of a catastrophe. Thank god they're safe. I'm going to strangle them both!

Waylon reached for the pocket where he occasionally kept his cigarette tin.

Empty.

Damn.

In his haste, he must've forgotten it. Such was life, he decided as he stormed across the tarmac, a tempest in a storm grey suit.

Ordinarily, he would've simply gone business casual, but these were not ordinary times. So he'd dressed to impress and intimidate, looking every bit the chief operations officer and co-owner of Burns Worldwide Consolidated that he knew he was. He wanted to make a statement to Monty, that he was not pleased, and he would handle the matter with a surgically precise hand.

As the limo drove him to the hospital, he rehearsed what he was going to say.

By the time it arrived, all planned speeches had been thrown to the wind. His heart, rather than his brain, was leading the charge.

Waylon swept into the lobby, and surged past the receptionists' station, leaving the matter of signing in to one of the loyal "yes-folk" he'd brought from the manor. He paused briefly at the nurse's station, and demanded direction to the critical care ward. Waylon had already made up his mind who he'd speak to first.

Two hallways and an elevator-ride later, and he was at the door to Burns' room.

He barged in without even pausing to knock.

...

The hospital room was well lit but sterile, and smelled of antiseptic cleaners. A single bed was pushed up against the walls. Charles Montgomery Burns lay in the bed, face turned towards the windows, arm propped up in an elevated cast. He looked pitifully thin and small under the white blanket. Waylon could see how sunken his cheeks looked in the light, how deep the circles under his eyes.

And still, it was not enough.

Waylon pulled the door shut behind him. The latch clicked with an odd finality.

Burns raised his head. "I know you must be very disappointed in me right now. Your aura was palpable from the moment you crossed into the room. It needs no introduction."

Waylon cupped his hands together behind his back. "Oh, it's not disappointment, Monty."

"Waylon..." Burns began slowly. "It is not as you make it. I had the situation firmly under control." He rolled over as best he could, till he was facing Waylon. "There was an unanticipated mishap, I confess that, although those can happen at the best of times. I'd been prepared. My TorusCom satellite phone was, most likely still is, neatly concealed in a hidden panel beside the pilot's seat. I made sure to include an emergency transponder in there as well, which I could've activated had the situation gotten out of control."

Waylon Smithers clasped his hands behind his back and stared down at the old man. He clenched his jaw, focused on keeping his expression neutral. Behind his back, out of Burns' sight, he squeezed his hands together with such force he could feel his knuckles pop.

Burns must've seen the stern look on Waylon's face. He held up a hand, imploring the younger man to hear him out.

"Smithers... Waylon... none of the casualties that occurred were in any way my intent. I had planned, at the most basic, to engage Ryan in a little unscripted charade. To see how he handled an emergency situation, and gauge his reactions thereof. Though you may not see it Waylon, I am getting older. The years that I delayed in my past have fought me, and are catching up faster than I anticipated."

Burns regarded his splinted arm for a moment. "In the littlest things, I notice them. From my own physical reserves to the grasp of my once unwavering intellect. Each dawn I know it: I am an irrevocable made weaker as the long days add on their weight to my stooping shoulders. In this, I am greeted by my own mortality, the increasing frailty of body and mind. I'm getting older Waylon. It is unavoidable.

"I don't regret it," Burns added, shaking his head. "It is a promise I made to you, and would gladly do again. Mayhaps I am selfish though, for when I step down as the executive and commander of the Springfield Nuclear Power Plant, I expect you to retire with me. In the meantime a suitable leader will take his place at the helm in the form of young Ryan. The lad has the wits and the tenacity to rule our company with a firm but delicate hand. My hope is to spend the rest of our lives, two old queens living out their golden years together, indulging in the simple pleasantries they had denied themselves in younger years. How does that all sound to you?"

Waylon felt the muscles of his jaws working, clenching and releasing as he ground his teeth together. He wondered vaguely, almost distractedly if it were possible to bite down so hard one's one teeth shattered in one's own head. Well, if that could happen, today would be the day.

Slowly, deliberately, he moved to the top of the bed and leaned over Burns, resting his hands into the firm hospital pillow, palms on either side of Burns' head. He willed his muscles to relax.

"Waylon, clearly you can understand-"

Smithers cut him of with a shake of his head. He lowered himself closer still, lips hovering centimeters above Burns cheek.

With a voice scarce more than a whisper, he spoke. His words were slow, deliberate, and unwavering.

"If you __ever,__ __EVER__ do __ANYTHING__ to put Ryan in danger again, __I am leaving you__."

He straightened his back, and glared down at Burns, cold fire flickering behind his brown eyes.

" _ _I don't care__ what you intentions were, and I don't care how prepared you __thought__ you were. You put my son in danger for your own selfish games, and that is something I will not tolerate. Ever."

Burns reached out his hand, but Waylon didn't take it. He turned his back on the old man, and was about to add something more when the door to the room opened softly.

...

Ryan Smithers poked his head around the frame. Immediately he sensed the tension in the room. He glanced nervously from his father to Burns, then back again. His father's eyes were stormy behind his glasses, mouth set in a firm line that meant business. Add in the full suit he wore, and this was definitely not a happy reunion.

Ryan quickly reconsidered his decision.

"Uh, hi Dad. The nurse said you were here, but if this is a bad time, I can leave." He backed out, started to pull the door shut again, but before he'd even made it halfway into the hallway his father was upon him.

Ryan found himself caught up in Waylon's long arms, pulled tightly against the wool suit coat in a crushing embrace. "Ryan," Waylon whispered as he stroked the young man's black hair. "I thought I'd never see you again."

Ryan discovered his own arms were wrapped around his father. He buried his face into Waylon's shoulder. His father's scent swirled around him, like an invisible hug. Notes of cologne, aftershave, and the deeper scent that was the man himself. Ryan realized his father smelled like Burns Manor. Or perhaps, more accurately, Burns Manor had come to smell like his father. Whatever order that was, it didn't matter. Ryan pressed his face against Waylon's collarbone, indifferent to the way his own glasses dug into his face. All that mattered right now is his father smelled like the safety and security of home.

After a long moment, Waylon's arms loosened, allowing Ryan to straighten up and step back.

"How's your hand?" Waylon asked, taking Ryan's wrist firmly, examining the area where the rattlesnake had bit.

Ryan flexed his fingers.

"I got lucky. It was mostly a dry bite. I guess the snake either didn't have time to inject me, or it didn't put in much. They said if it was a real, full bite, I would've been dead before I even made it to that house."

Waylon rested his hand on Ryan's arm, guiding him gently but forcefully out of the room and into the hall. Ryan noted his father didn't even pause to look back at Burns. Ryan did, however, and caught the look in the old man's eyes.

"How much did he tell you?"

Ryan didn't have to ask who __he__ was. He leaned against the wall, and straightened his glasses.

"About?"

Waylon gestured back towards the room. "He put you up to this. It was a test. He'd never intended things to get so out of hand. He brought a phone, he had a tracer. He planned the whole thing, Ryan. Staging a crash, faking it all to see how you'd handle it."

The creases in Waylon's face deepened as he fell silent. Ryan saw a silent war going on behind his father's brown eyes. He wondered what, if anything he could say.

"I hate hospitals," Waylon announced, a comment out of the blue. "No offense to the fine healthcare team," he added as a passing orderly gave him a miffed look. He leaned against the wall next to Ryan, and shoved his hands deep into the pocket of his suit coat. "Everything about them, it's hell for me."

Ryan shuffled his slippered feet, staring at the tiled floor. Sometimes the only thing to say was the truth. "I knew."

Waylon stared at him blankly.

Ryan rubbed the back of his neck and continued staring at the floor. "I knew about it being a test, and how Monty completely screwed the pooch on his fake-crash attempt. He told me. I don't remember all of it, I was only half-conscious. But he told me how he'd misjudged the distance from the reflections on the water, how he never expected to catch a submerged island in the middle of the lake. I guess he thought I was dying, or going to die. So he told me everything."

He pursed his lips, and looked up at his father. "Monty was crying, or at least I think he was. He __is__ sorry about it. He never meant for anything to turn out like this..." Ryan let his sentence trail off, waiting for some response, __any__ response from his stoic father.

"Do you know why he did this?"

Ryan saw his reflection in his father's glasses. And in that, a smaller reflection of his father from the mirrors of his own. So on, ad infinitum, an endless cycle of his father and himself falling into one another.

"He told me he wants me to take over the nuclear power plant, and perhaps someday Burns Worldwide itself," Ryan answered. Truth. It was best that way.

Waylon fussed at his tie for a moment before replying. "Is that what __you__ want, Ryan? This isn't his life, or even mine. This is your own, and only you can make those choices."

"Right now? Honestly, I don't know. Yes... maybe... it all depends. It's too early to make that sort of decision; but I guess I wouldn't be opposed to it, if it ever came up." He offered a weak shrug. He knew it wasn't the answer his father wanted.

After several moments of awkward silence, broken only by the various wheeled carts and occasional hospital announcements, Ryan sighed. This wasn't silence. It was a world of noise and sound. Here the click of a visitor's heels. There, the rustle of a nurse's clipboard as he flipped through charts. The phones ringing, the ever-present background hum of the ventilation system. It wasn't silent, anymore than the woods had been silent after he learned to listen.

Ryan wondered if he'd ever even experienced true silence. Life was happening all around him. Movement, time, the world marching on. All those times he thought were quiet, he'd just been preoccupied with the noise of his own thoughts.

He closed his eyes, like he'd done in the wilderness.

As it had on the lakeshore, the world suddenly became much larger.

Ryan could hear the rustle of cloth as his father shifted his weight from one foot to the other. He became aware of his father's breath, slow and controlled. Letting his mind expand further, Ryan could almost imagine he heard his own heartbeat, the soft __lub-dub__ under his ribs. He inhaled through his nose, held his breath a moment, then released, letting the air swirl out of his lungs and carry his tension with it.

"It is my own life, you're right about that, Waylon. Dad. Sometimes we do the right things for all the wrong reasons. And sometimes, people do the wrong things but it turns out right in the end."

He opened his eyes, and the world shrank down. Once again he was in a narrow hallway, standing side-by-side with his father. "I think Monty meant to do good. I mean, I have to right? If it's a choice, well, he almost killed us but I learned how to be alive from it; and if I'ever forgiven you, it seems only right to forgive him too." Ryan folded his arms behind his head, stared at the ceiling tiles and fluorescent lights. Above that, more floors. But beyond that he knew was an open sky.

"Honestly, Dad? Between you and me, I don't regret this. Any of it. It was kind of worth it, in its own way. Probably not to you; and Monty did go about things the __wrong way__. I hope though, if I can forgive him, that maybe in time, you can too?" He peered at Waylon out of the corner of his eye, trying to mimic his father's poker face. He didn't want to seem too hopeful, but it was hard to conceal his heart. Ryan didn't have his father's years of practice to his name.

Waylon might've seen that glimmer, or he might've missed it.

Ryan never knew for sure.

All he did know was that his father was clasping his shoulder in the way of men, of equals, and giving him a firm squeeze. "I still love him, Ryan. That won't change. I love you too, and I'm not leaving you. Whatever happens, we're a family."

Ryan tilted his head towards Burns' room. "All of us?"

"You care about him don't you." It wasn't a question.

Ryan couldn't help but smirk. "I dragged his unconscious ass through god's country and and bumfuc- er, the middle of nowhere!" Ryan draped his arm over Waylon's. "Seriously, no one does that for fun. Like you said, we're family. We might be pretty fucked up by 'normal' standards, but that's okay. I like what we have. I'm glad I found you."

Waylon pulled Ryan into another hug, ignoring the younger man's protests about manliness and dignity.

"Okay, okay!" Ryan laughed, pushing himself back. "Jeeze, Dad! People are watching! Let's go find the doctor and see how long he'd got to stay in traction. Then, as soon as he gets cleared to go, let's make like sheep and get the flock outta here, because I've got a confession, Dad: I hate hospitals too."

With that, Ryan gave his father a playful slug in the arm, grinned, and pushed his way down the hall. He didn't notice Waylon rub the spot he'd punched, and missed the look of proud surprise across his face.

Without another word, Waylon turned, and followed his son.

* * *

 _ **Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.**_

 _Winston Churchill_

 _ **A good beginning makes a good end.**_

 _Louis L'Amour_


End file.
